Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 5 November 2024
1078. Deputy Ivana Bacik asked the Minister for Health in respect of the 2022 Women’s Health Action Plan, if he will report on his Department’s achievement of the maternal health goal of establishing an obstetrics event support team to support families. [44226/24]
Amharc ar fhreagraThe HSE Obstetric Event Support Team (OEST) is a service provided by the HSE National Women & Infants Health Programme (NWIHP) to maternity hospitals/units to support the review process of a defined list of obstetric adverse events. The OEST provides a process for the sharing and implementation of learning and recommendations both locally and nationally. The OEST aims to support the maternity networks as they respond to the events in terms of overseeing and advising on appointment of the review panel, family engagement, conduct of the review, finalisation of the review report and follow up. In addition to assisting the health services in responding to severe maternity related incidents and in the provision of appropriate supports for patients and families, the OEST aims to ensure appropriate expert level support is available nationally by enabling learning from adverse maternity incidents to be actioned at a national level and by promoting engagement with relevant stakeholders across the maternity network.
Funding of €540,000 was provided to support the establishment and expansion of the OEST, within NWIHP, from Budget 2022 via the Women’s Health Action Plan 2022-2023. The OEST has been established and all maternity services nationally are engaging with OEST to share the learnings from events.
