2016 Health Service Excellence Awards West Showcase Event

On Wednesday 15th June at the Radisson Hotel Sligo a special celebration event was held to acknowledge the excellent work that is taking place throughout both the acute hospital sector and the community health services throughout the border and western counties from Donegal to Limerick.

Approximately 80 HSE staff attended the event, representing a total of 89 projects from the West who submitted applications to the 2016 Health Service Excellence Awards.

Speaking at the event the HSE Assistant National Director for Human Resources Francis Rodgers stated ‘ As awards Co-ordinator for HSE West I’m delighted to be here today to acknowledge all of the hard work and dedication of the staff involved in all of the 89 projects that were submitted to the national Health Excellence Awards from the West.’  He added ‘ We are proud to be hosting the first of the awards showcase events and I wish to start today by congratulating the overall winner of the 2016 Awards a joint project between the Ophthalmology Service Sligo University Hospital and colleagues working within Sligo/Leitrim Community Health Organisation Area 1 to create an improved model of care for patients.  As a result of this project, 1400 additional outpatients have been seen in the service in 2015, reducing the waiting list by 45%.’

In total 426 projects were submitted to the national awards from throughout the health services in Ireland, seven of which were short-listed to compete for overall winner and seven more were highly recommended.

One of the seven short listed was the ‘National Clinical Progamme for Acute Coronary Syndrome Programme (ACS)’. This programme was initiated in 2010 to save lives by ensuring that patients suffering from a major heart attack have direct access to standardised, high-quality services in designated centres around Ireland. It is a joint venture between the Irish Cardiac Society and the HSE.  A patient Michael Delorey from Carrick-on-Shannon Leitrim who suffered a heart attack and was subsequently treated in both Galway and Sligo University Hospitals described the programme as follows ‘The whole process is amazing.  It’s a brilliant service; It works because it saves time, bed hours, staff and resources.  I have nothing but the height of praise for the HSE’

Marie O’Haire from HSE HR Leadership, Education and Development, commented ‘Today is an opportunity to recognise the achievements of staff throughout the West who have been involved in these projects.  It is a forum for learning and networking as this process enables us to identify great service developments that can be shared and implemented as appropriate in different parts of the Health Service.  It encourages staff to have pride in the work that they do and the services that they deliver.  It is also intended to encourage and inspire all staff members to get involved in developing better services that result in easier access and high quality care to patients.’

For further information on the Health Excellence awards please visit: http://www.hse.ie/eng/staff/HealthServiceExcellenceAwards2016/

Photo: Project representatives from Saolta University Health Care Group along with Francis Rogers, Assistant National Director of HR & Marie O Haire, HSE HR Leadership, Education and Development