The Government has dropped the existing co-location policy of moving the Rotunda Hospital to Connolly Hospital.
A new planning application for the development of maternity services at the Rotunda Hospital is to be submitted.
It was agreed at a meeting today between Minister for Health Jennifer Carroll MacNeill and officials from the Department of Health, the Rotunda and the HSE.
The new application will involve expanded critical care capacity for women, expanding on the earlier application which was focused solely on infants.
There will also be an enhanced Sexual Assault Treatment Unit.
Ms Carroll MacNeill said that enhancing critical care facilities on the Rotunda site will differentiate the Rotunda from the 2015 policy to co-locate with Connolly Hospital, because the full benefits of co-location can be achieved by the close proximity, the already established pathways to the Mater Hospital.
The minister said her intention is to focus on the future of the Rotunda on the current site, and it is open to a future Government to take a different approach.
Last month, a decision to approve the proposed development of a new €100 million four-storey critical care wing at the Rotunda Hospital in Dublin, was overturned by An Coimisiún Pleanála.
