Orla was first appointed to the Commission in April 2022.
Dr Orla Healy is the National Clinical Director of Quality and Patient Safety in the HSE. She was based in the Department of Public Health (DPH), HSE South (Cork and Kerry) from 2005 to 2017 during which time she subspecialised in health service improvement. She fulfilled multiple senior national roles in quality and patient safety in the HSE between 2008 and 2017 as the Public Health Consultant on all the HSE national incident management teams since their inception in 2008. During that time, Orla was also involved in acute hospital policy formation and implementation at a national and regional level as a member of the Reconfiguration Executive for Cork and Kerry, and she was Public Health Representative on the Reconfiguration Forum. In June 2012, she took up a secondment at the Department of Health to provide public health expertise to the team for the formation of hospital groups. In May 2016, she moved to a work in the South/South West Hospital Group.
During her five years with the SSWHG, she occupied a range of senior management roles and was also seconded to work with the National Screening Service on a plan for the audit of interval cancer in the screened population. In 2018, she was made Adjunct Clinical Professor in the School of Public Health UCC. Since taking up her current post in April 2021, Orla has led the newly established National Quality and Patient Safety Directorate (NQPSD) in its delivery of purpose, aligned with the Patient Safety Strategy 2019-2024. Over the course of her career Orla has used clinical, public health and management training and experience to bring about health service improvement.
First appointed: 05/04/2022
End of Term: 04/04/2027
Position Type: Member
Basis of Appointment: nominated by the HSE; appointed by the Minister of State for Mental Health and Older People.
