{"id":161074,"date":"2025-11-26T18:05:08","date_gmt":"2025-11-26T18:05:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/161074\/"},"modified":"2025-11-26T18:05:08","modified_gmt":"2025-11-26T18:05:08","slug":"private-maternity-care-will-disappear-within-five-to-10-years-maximum","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/161074\/","title":{"rendered":"Private maternity care will disappear within ‘five to 10 years maximum’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Private maternity care will disappear within \u201cfive to 10 years maximum\u201d, a Professor of the National Maternity Hospital has predicted.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Under the new public only contracts negotiated during Stephen Donnelly\u2019s tenure as Health Minister, consultants are prohibited from carrying out private work in public hospitals.\u00a0<\/p>\n

While some consultants are still working out their notice on the old contracts, Professor Shane Higgins said it was only a matter of time before all consultant obstetricians sign up to the new public only contracts.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u201cThere isn\u2019t a private maternity elsewhere in the country, which means when the consultants who are on the old style contracts are phased out – so when they retire and transition – they\u2019ll be replaced by public only,\u201d he explained on Lunchtime Live<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWhich means in a relatively short period of time there will be no private maternity care available for patients to choose.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd I\u2019m talking probably five to 10 years maximum before that offering disappears.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"A A pregnant woman. Picture by: Lorna E5A6PR\/Design Pics via ZUMA Wire.<\/p>\n

While in theory, a new private maternity hospital could be opened in the next few years, Professor Higgins described this as \u201cextremely unlikely\u201d.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThe last private maternity hospital in the country was Mount Carmel and that\u2019s closed over a decade,\u201d he said.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Currently, a majority of new mothers give birth on the public system.\u00a0<\/p>\n

However, a substantial minority opt for an element of private healthcare.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cBetween semi-private and private, both allow patients to use their private health insurance for cover, there\u2019s about 40% of our patients would fall into that semi-private, private group,\u201d Professor Higgins said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIn private, you actually choose your consultant; you look up the list of consultants offering private maternity care in the hospital and you choose your consultant.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cYou enter into a contract with them where they will provide you with antenatal care and will do everything they can to be present at the birth of your baby.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIf they are not there at the birth of your baby, another consultant will be there.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Doctor A doctor checking the heart rate of pregnant woman’s baby. Picture by: Ievgen Chabanov \/ Alamy.<\/p>\n

Professor Higgins explained that some women like the continuity of care that comes with having seeing the same doctor throughout their pregnancy.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He added that some women have chosen him as their consultant for all their pregnancies.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIn semi-private, you are assigned a consultant who has undertaken semi-private work in the hospital,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen it comes to labour and delivery, it would be under the team who are on call for the day – rather than the consultant you\u2019ve booked or has been assigned to you in their absence.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo, you would be more like a public patient in terms of the care that you receive in delivery than a private patient.\u201d<\/p>\n

Main image: A doctor doing an ultrasonic testing of a pregnant patient. Picture by: Alamy.com.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Private maternity care will disappear within \u201cfive to 10 years maximum\u201d, a Professor of the National Maternity Hospital…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":161075,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[103,397,396,61,60],"class_list":{"0":"post-161074","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-healthcare","8":"tag-health","9":"tag-health-care","10":"tag-healthcare","11":"tag-ie","12":"tag-ireland"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161074","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=161074"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161074\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/161075"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=161074"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=161074"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=161074"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}