The Minister for Health is to ask the HSE to expand cardiac services at University Hospital Waterford to a 24/7 service.
Cardiac services at the hospital currently operate from 8am to 8pm.
The minister announced the decision in the wake of the publication of the National Review of Adult Specialist Cardiac Services in Ireland.
The long-awaited review began in 2018 and was established following calls for the University Hospital Waterford to be granted a 24/7 cardiology service.
In a statement announcing the publication of the report, Minister Jennifer Carroll MacNeill said the Government would aim to implement the review's recommendations.
It said: "In line with the evidence-based approach of the review, and noting data from the recent Irish Heart Attack Audits, the Minister for Health will ask the Health Service Executive to continue the provision of primary percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) for acute heart attacks at University Hospital Limerick (currently 24/7), and to expand the service at University Hospital Waterford to a 24/7 service (currently 8am to 8pm, seven days a week), in order to meet the needs of their respective regional populations."
In the review report, the steering group recommend as a first step, the restructuring and strengthening of the National Heart Programme.
It recommended that the National Heart Programme should have a structure and remit similar to the National Cancer Control Programme.
The minister says she has written to the HSE to begin developing an implementation plan by June of this year.
Speaking on RTÉ News at One, Minister Carroll MacNeill said that "Waterford's numbers have grown and grown, even since the review was completed at the end of 2022".
"It's very clear that although we have extended it to an 8am-8pm service, we need to extend that further," she said.
The minister said there was funding available to "immediately" recruit another five people to build on that within the next 12 to 18 months.
She added that there was a struggle regarding recruitment, but that the funding was secured to begin the process.
Review recommends four national cardiac centres
The National Review of Adult Specialist Cardiac Services has recommended four national comprehensive cardiac centres in Dublin, Cork and Galway.
Those centres would be at the Mater Misericordiae University Hospital and St James's Hospital in Dublin, as well as Cork and Galway University Hospitals.
The review, said that complex interventional cardiology services should be carried out in these centres, with these services providing support to regional cardiac networks.
The review calls for specialist cardiac services to be organised into six regional cardiac networks, aligned to the six new Regional Health Authorities.
It says that an integrated comprehensive national cardiac services and cardiology workforce plan should be developed to ensure an appropriate balance in provision of services by region, subspecialty and categories of healthcare professional.
