Mission and Vision
Mission
To deliver quality specialist services for older people, with a very high standard of clinical care, within a social care model and on a person centred basis.
Vision
To be a leading provider of high quality, person centred services for older people within a compliant, enabling and empowered environment.
Leopardstown Park Hospital Celebrates its Centenary 1917 - 2017
Foreword
I suppose it's a valid claim that any period of 100 years in the history of Ireland can be tumultuous and exciting but it is without doubt that the century 1917--2017 must rank as the most tumultuous. It opens with the fallout from the recently commemorated 1916 Rebellion, followed by the execution of the leaders, the 1918 election ,the War of Independence, the Civil War, the declaration of the Republic, World War 11,the economic war, joining the then Common Market, the Anglo-Irish Agreements (Sunningdale and Good Friday) up to the most recent manifestations of normality in Anglo-Irish relations. Through all of that turmoil Leopardstown Park Hospital filled faithfully its primary role of caring for the sick and aged population of Dublin and surrounding districts as well as our foundation role of caring for veterans of forces of Her Majesty’s Forces in Ireland. The Leopardstown Park Hospital (1979) Establishment Order brought the Hospital under the control of the Department of Health as well as protecting the rights of Veterans as "principal primary beneficiaries. In celebrating the centenary we pay tribute to our benefactor Mrs. Gertrude Power Dunning, our dedicated staff, medical, nursing, allied health, carers and administrative right up to the present day who have delivered quality care to thousands of residents and patients. This commitment to quality care is still our hallmark and our aspiration at this significant milestone in our history is to perpetuate and grow this ethos in to the future. We rely on our history as a solid foundation for the years ahead.
History
In October 1917 Gertrude Dunning gifted Leopardstown Park, a magnificent country manor set in 100 acres of parkland, to the British Ministry of Pensions. Prompted by the devastation of the First World War, the gift came with a single condition – the house and its grounds were to be used to treat soldiers who had been disabled while serving with the British forces. From very early on in First World War, the sheer number of wounded and disabled soldiers returning to Ireland had overwhelmed the bed capacity of existing hospitals. Leopardstown Park’s transformation into a hospital was mirrored across the country, with more than 100 voluntary hospitals established between 1914 and 1918 to help meet demand. Uniquely among these hospitals, however, Leopardstown Park had been gifted in trust to the British government for as long as it was needed to treat war pensioners. Nestled in the foothills of the Dublin Mountains, surrounded by vast expanses of meadows and woodland, the house and grounds were considered ideal for the treatment of shell-shocked men. Leopardstown Park Hospital operated as a specialist hospital for shell shock until 1931 and was, after 1922, the only such hospital in the Irish Free State. From 1931 its services expanded to general medical and surgical care, as well as artificial limb fitting and maintenance. Though financed and managed by the British government, the vast majority of Leopardstown Park’s patients were Irish citizens. Having solely admitted British forces ex-servicemen for the first six decades of its existence, the hospital opened its doors to the wider Irish public in the 1970s. Falling patient numbers ensured that, during the late 1960s, the hospital was occasionally operating at less than 50% capacity. In the midst of difficult Anglo-Irish diplomatic relations as the violence in Northern Ireland intensified, the Irish and British governments successfully negotiated the transfer of Leopardstown Park Hospital to the Irish Department of Health in 1979. Over the past four decades, the hospital has developed into a key component in the provision of medical services for older people in the South Dublin area. Nonetheless, though its patient profile has evolved dramatically since 1979, Leopardstown Park Hospital retains its close connection with the British ex-service community.