Planning permission has been secured for an 8-bed Roscommon Hospice Palliative Care Centre which is to be located near the County Hospital. The planning was granted by Roscommon County Council in recent days.
Expressing delight, Martina Jennings, CEO of Mayo/Roscommon Hospice Foundation, thanked the people of the region for their great support. Ms. Jennings noted that news of the planning approval comes just as completion of a 14-bed Palliative Care Centre in Castlebar is achieved.
“Today is a day to celebrate this huge milestone, but to also remember and give thanks to everyone who has brought us this far” said Mayo/Roscommon Hospice chairperson Joanne Hynes. Remembering Castlerea businessman and founding director John Tully, who sadly passed away last year, she said: “We are sure that John is looking down on us very proudly today”.
The Hospice project consists of eight in-patient bedrooms, homecare and administration offices, a café/restaurant, reflection room and family visitors’ suite.
The proposed building is primarily single level with part two storeys in height. The development will also include a pedestrian and vehicle access route, landscaped therapy gardens and more than 30 car-parking parking spaces. The Hospice Foundation said that the Roscommon project will go to tender before the end of this year and will cost in the region of €6m. The project will be operational by 2021.
Senator Frank Feighan welcomed news of the planning go-ahead. “This is fantastic news for this state-of-the-art development which I have strongly advocated for over many years.
“This Palliative Care Centre will address the critical lack of an in-patient hospice care facility in County Roscommon and enable patients with life-limiting illnesses to access expert in-patient help locally”.
