The Health Service Executive (HSE) and the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (RCSI) today jointly launched the National Clinical Programme for Emergency Medicine (EMP) Model of Care 2025, the most significant update to Ireland’s strategy for delivering urgent and emergency care in more than a decade.

The Model of Care is aimed at ensuring that emergency care evolves in line with the needs of patients and the principles of Sláintecare. It reflects significant healthcare reforms population growth and lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic. It also emphasises the importance of patient participation in shaping services, ensuring that care is designed around the people who access it.

The new Model of Care, which builds on the original framework published in 2012, was developed by the RCSI National Clinical Programme for Emergency Medicine and HSE, following patient engagement and consultation with emergency medicine teams around Ireland.

It highlights a shift towards more proactive and patient-centred approaches to urgent and emergency care and emphasises the importance of “right care, right place, right time” through four key pillars: organisation of care, patient pathways, infrastructure, and quality improvement.

It also calls for stronger pre-hospital and community-based services so that patients can access care in the most appropriate setting, while also developing specialised services tailored to paediatric and older patients.

The document describes how multidisciplinary teams will play a greater role in delivering care, supported by expanded advanced practice roles and sustainable workforce planning and the importance of data-driven tools and digital innovation in to improving patient flow, guiding decision-making and supporting value-based care.

Speaking at today’s launch, Minister for Health Jennifer Carroll MacNeill said: “This Model of Care is a comprehensive and welcome step forward to our shared objective of improving the quality, safety and accessibility of our emergency care services. At its heart, this is about dignity, safety and trust.

“Today, we are not simply launching a document – we are reaffirming our commitment to every person who attends an emergency department or injury unit, day or night. I want to sincerely thank the clinicians, nurses, healthcare professionals and patients who contributed to this model. Your unwavering commitment to excellence and best practice has brought us to this moment.

“As Minister for Health, one of my priorities is ensuring that people can access the support they need when they need it. I look forward to continuing the strong collaboration with the Emergency Medicine Programme as we work together to deliver better outcomes for all.”

Commenting on the launch, Colm Henry, Chief Clinical Officer, HSE said: “This Model of Care represents a significant step forward for emergency care in Ireland. It reflects both the challenges and opportunities of today’s healthcare landscape, from demographic change to digital transformation, and ensures our services are equipped to deliver safe, high-quality, and patient-centred care that prioritises patient safety now and into the future.”

Professor Deborah McNamara, RCSI President, said: “The launch of this Model of Care sets out a vision for more integrated, equitable and sustainable emergency care across Ireland. Putting patient care at the centre, it will support the development of a resilient, sustainable and patient-focused emergency care system. It was written by frontline clinicians, nurses and healthcare professionals who gave their time and expertise on a goodwill basis on top of their demanding roles. Their insight is what makes this document practical, credible and achievable.

“The Model of Care that we are launching today is a demonstration of the value of collaborative partnership between RCSI and the HSE,” added Professor McNamara.

Alongside the Model of Care, the Emergency Medicine Progamme has also launched several complementary initiatives designed to strengthen emergency care delivery nationwide:

• Green Emergency Medicine Framework: a national quality improvement framework supporting emergency departments, injury units and urgent care centres to deliver safer, greener and more resource-efficient care.
• National Emergency Department Triage Quality Improvement Framework (2025–2027): a strategy to restore triage to its core function of prioritisation of relative clinical urgency for patients undergoing triage, while building the supporting infrastructure required to deliver diagnostics, therapeutic interventions and other appropriate assessments as soon as possible after triage.
• Emergency Care Activity Profile: a dashboard of emergency department information, which allows sites to understand both their own data and compare it to other sites nationally.
• Emergency Medicine Airway Registry Ireland Preliminary Report: a comprehensive report on emergency intubation practices, patient outcomes, and benchmarking across Irish hospitals.

The Emergency Medicine Programme (EMP) Model of Care 2025 can be read here.