The hospital has approximately 600 beds including day beds and serves an immediate population in its local catchment area of approximately 185,000. It is the national centre for:

• Cardiac surgery
• Heart and Lung Transplantation
• Extra Corporeal Life Support (ECLS)
• Spinal Injuries
• Pulmonary hypertension
• National Isolation Unit
• Bone Anchored Hearing Aid

Other clinical specialties include but are not limited to cardiology, ophthalmology, haematology / oncology, nephrology, urology, infectious diseases, psychiatry, ear nose and throat, rheumatology, diabetes and endocrinology, neurology and stroke care, a multidisciplinary breast care centre, respiratory medicine, vascular surgery, interventional radiology, emergency and intensive care medicine, plastic surgery, general and colo-rectal surgery, orthopaedics, medicine for the elderly, pain and palliative care medicine.

For our medical students, the hospital is a primary location for their clinical education and training in medicine and surgery as well as for medical internship, basic medical and subsequent higher specialist training. Approximately 120 students undertake their primary clinical training at the Mater Misericordiae University Hospital, rotating through medical and surgical specialties at the hospital and elsewhere within our clinical training network. 

Having one of Ireland's leading radiology centres and being one of the first locations for the national Breast Cancer Screening programme, the hospital is also an important clinical training centre for our radiography students. Students typically attend structured clinical training sessions at the hospital during Year 3 and Year 4 of their degree programme.

The hospital is one of two locations of the UCD Clinical Research Centre, Ireland's first academic-led research unit to be approved by the Irish Medicines Board for the conduct of clinical trials and investigator-led investigations.

Staff at the hospital also provide advanced specialist training across a number of programme areas including

• Advanced education and training of general practitioners (North Dublin GP Training Scheme)
• Clinical translational research
• Dermatology
• Psychotherapy

The Mater has been a pioneer in healthcare since its foundation and its staff continue this proud tradition of clinical leadership.  Some of the hospital's highlights include, but are not limited to:

• First open heart surgery in Ireland led by Prof Eoin O'Malley (1957)
• National Cardiac Unit (1971)
• First heart transplant in Ireland  (1985)
• National Spinal Injuries Centre (1998)
• First Breast Cancer Screening centre (2000)
• First lung transplant in Ireland (2004)
• Ireland's most successful Clinical Research Centre (2005)
• Co-founder of Ireland's first academic medical centre, Dublin Academic Medical Centre (2007)
• Ireland's Largest 24 hour 'On Call' Accident & Emergency Centre