Portiuncula Hospital has also taken the move to defer non-urgent procedures and appointments in the face of a rise in COVID-19 patients.
For the next two weeks outpatient clinics will take place virtually unless it is absolutely necessary to meet the patient in person.
The hospital is also deferring all but very urgent and time critical inpatient and day surgery appointments.
James Keane, Hospital Manager at PUH said, “We regret the impact that these deferrals will have on our patients but it is a really important part of maintaining critical and emergency services.”
There were five confirmed cases of COVID-19 at Portiuncula Hospital as of 8pm on Tuesday evening, of whom one is in in Intensive Care.
It is expected that the rollout of vaccines for front line workers at Portiuncula will begin this week.
Patients at Portiuncula who will have an appointment or procedure deferred will be contacted by the hospital directly.
“We ask patients who are attending the hospital for a procedure, urgent outpatients or maternity-related scans to continue to follow all the public health guidance including wearing a face mask.
“We also remind patients to attend the hospital alone, unless the support of another person is essential.”
Visiting restrictions also remain in place at Portiuncula Hospital. People should not visit except on compassionate grounds, and these visits must be arranged with the ward’s nurse manager beforehand.
James Keane also issued a fresh reminder that people should only come to the A&E in the case of emergencies.
If a problem is not urgent, people are advised to contact their GP during normal surgery hours or the Westdoc GP out of hours service, in the first instance.
