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HEALTH MINISTER STEPHEN Donnelly has given an update on the restrictions on partners attending emergency and high-risk maternity appointments, adding that the issue has been a source of “frustration” for women, the HSE, and the Government.
Partners of pregnant women had been advised not to attend maternity appointments during Level 5 restrictions due to infection control measures, in order to keep both pregnant women and the staff who care for them safe. After number of cases fell to a rate considered ‘low’, and once healthcare staff were vaccinated, these guidelines were lifted.
After a number of stories were raised of partners not being permitted to attend appointments, mothers’ and women’s advocacy groups began calling for partners to be allowed to attend pre-natal appointments, the delivery suite and post-natal wards.
Despite several members of the Government and HSE agreeing that partners should be permitted to attend, there are still frequently cases raised where partners are refused to attend maternity appointments with pregnant women.
Speaking to an Oireachtas Health Committee today, Donnelly said that this was “a source of frustration for women and their partners, it is a source of frustration for me, and I know it is a source of frustration for the HSE as well”.
In response to a question from Labour Senator Annie Hoey, Donnelly gave a detailed breakdown of what hospitals are allowing partners to attend maternity services.
He said that the current HSE guidance on partners attending hospitals is that daily visits, which is a minimum of 30 minutes for:
the anomaly scan (20-week scan),
the neonatal intensive care unit, and
the birth, right from the start of labour until the end.
He said that it hasn’t always been possible to facilitate visits to the multi-occupancy antenatal wards before labour due to infection prevention control reasons, which was the case before Covid-19.
In relation to unplanned attendance due to emergency presentations, the HSE issued updated guidance on 24 June.
Donnelly said: “There has been a real issue there, it is arguably the most important time.”
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He said his officials have surveyed compliance with emergency presentations at all 19 maternity hospitals and units through the six hospital groups that represent them, and as of this week:
18 of the 19 units are allowing partners to attend early-assessment units
12 of the 19 are allowing partners to attend in cases of high-risk pregnancies
15 of the 19 are allowing partners to attend in cases of emergency presentations.
“I am engaging with the HSE to get up to full compliance across all 19 units – it is a lot higher than it was,” Donnelly said.
He said that although they are “moving at pace” on this, he said he was “very conscious” of individual cases.
I’m aware of very very difficult cases where there are emergency presentations, but there still isn’t access for the partner, which is causing huge grief and huge problems for the woman and for the partner as well.
“So we’ve got to keep working with the HSE to get full compliance across all 19 units.”
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Donnolly says it is a source of frustration for women, the hse and the government. All very true im sure but what about the men who want to be with their wives or girlfriends?
@Brian Dunne: it’s a joke (not a funny one), I was only allowed to attend one scan but got turned away because my 2yo daughter wasn’t allowed in. We have no minder (other than my wife herself) and no family in Ireland.
I cannot understand who is in charge here and how this is still happening and being discussed. ALL restrictions should be lifted in maternity hospitals. Women and partners shouldn’t be thankful of what little restrictions are being lifted. It’s a shame people just can’t flat out refuse to comply now. If Donnelly can’t even get them all to lift a few restrictions then I dread to think when it’s going to return to normal.
What a joke. It’s amazing how uncoordinated they are, Donnelly says one thing, HSE says another, hospitals say something different. It doesn’t make any logical sense either, most parents live with each other, the odds of one of them having Covid and the other one not is slim. I feel so sorry both for the Mother who has to go through it alone and the Father for not being allowed to be with his partner. Shame on this government, yet another scandal under this government.
After all this is over it’s going to be the families who weren’t allowed attend to dying elderly alone in nursing homes and hospitals etc and parents that lost babies through various difficulties who will suffer for years beyond this point. While i understand the infection control importance, not being there when someone you love passes away or when a pregnancy ends in grief will be remembered as a very sad time in history. I lost my mother to cancer in 2019 and consider myself lucky. As my whole family got to say goodbye. Its not frustration its anger, grief and misery.
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