A grandad of 38 children has praised a hospital for saving his life after he had four strokes in a day.
Thomas Boyle, 78, attended a huge rally of 8,000 people on Saturday in protest of having the Navan hospital’s A and E service downgraded.
The father-of-nine said: “It makes me sad to see that Navan is getting 10 times bigger than what it used to be and they want to close down the hospital, it doesn’t make sense.
“They should be making the hospital bigger, not closing it down.
“Everyone came out today to show that the people of Meath are not going to let this happen without a fight. I spent a week there and the care was out of this world, they couldn’t do enough for you.
“Those in power can’t see any further than their noses, they don’t care about us. They want to save money; they don’t care about the lives they are putting at risk.”
He took to the streets of Navan alongside a strong crowd to protest at the downgrading of Meath’s only hospital.
The Rally was organised by The Save Navan Hospital Campaign amid fresh concerns that the current A&E service will be replaced with a medical assessment unit or closed down.
Mr Boyle suffered four consecutive strokes in 2007 and said he was told when he presented at Our Lady’s Hospital in Navan that if hadn’t arrived when he did that, he would be dead.
He recalls: “I had a stroke 14 years ago, I was at home and I didn’t even know that it was a stroke, it was only when I went out to call my wife that I realised that I couldn’t speak, it was terrifying.
“I went to my doctor and I took another one in the surgery then he sent me up to A&E and I took another one at the traffic lights above at Parc Tailteann on the way and then I went into A&E and took another one there.
“They brought me in and said another five minutes and I would have been gone.
“If I had to go over to Drogheda, there wouldn’t have been a chance that I’d have survived. Navan hospital saved my life.”
