Minister feels 'shame' that women with endometriosis had to go abroad for surgery

THE HEALTH MINISTER has said she feels shame that women with endometriosis in Ireland have had to get surgery in foreign countries because specialised care isn’t available at home.

She said that women have been “treated differently” within the healthcare system, and the government ‘doesn’t want’ to send them abroad for important surgery, but sometimes it’s the only option.

Jennifer Carroll MacNeill was speaking during Leaders’ Questions in the Dáil today in response to issues raised by Social Democrats TD Jennifer Whitmore.

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Whitmore said it’s “shameful” that a country as wealthy as Ireland is “exporting” women for surgery.

She referenced an RTÉ report that highlighted the story of a Roscommon doctor who was forced to travel to Poland for a life-saving procedure. 

MacNeill said:

It’s a shame on me and a shame on everybody else that a doctor in our health system used her HSE salary and a loan to get emergency surgery in a different jurisdiction.

Endometriosis causes cells, similar to those in the lining of the womb, to grow outside the uterus and can cause a range of symptoms, with some people experiencing chronic, debilitating pain.

It is believed to affect as many as one in seven women in Ireland and there is no known cure.

Whitmore today said: “I can understand why, as an emergency measure, women have to go overseas. We don’t have the capacity here.

“But women in Ireland are so sick and tired of being exported every single time our health service is not able to meet our needs. It’s the first response that we’re given: send us abroad.

It is not the way to treat people.

The minister concurred with Whitmore regarding the lack of specialised care in Ireland, and agreed that funding has been “too low”.

She said: “We don’t want to send women abroad. I want them to get their surgeries here.

“There’s still a need for specialist services, and if I have a choice between funding a woman to go abroad or her not getting that surgery in Ireland, like of course we’re going to send to facilitate her going abroad.”

The minister has previously apologised to women who waited years to be diagnosed with endometriosis, and wrote to GPs around the country to remind them of the prevalence of the condition.

MacNeill today said: “How many women have I spoken to that have been suffering for 20, 25, and 30 years with chronic pain, with not being understood, with having to leave work, with having a completely different fertility experience, with having a totally different family life?

“Women have been treated differently in the medical system.”

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