Cardiac services to expand in Ireland

The Irish government has announced a radical overhaul and expansion of heart and lung surgery services. The scheme, to cost in excess of £Ir40m (£48m), will increase the capacity for cardiac surgery by more than 50%–which will give the country one of the highest cardiac operations ratios per capita in the world (about 1000 per million of population).

The announcement was made just days before details of a study of cardiac waiting lists at two major Dublin hospitals showed that not only had …