Nurses take industrial action
FORTY-TWO patients lay in trolleys at the Mid Western Regional Hospital on Tuesday, leading to work-to-rule industrial action at the hospital by members of the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation.
Mary Fogarty, industrial relations officer for the INMO, said: “Overcrowding has been a problem everyday since the reconfiguration of services last year”.
All cancer services, night time emergencies as well as all major surgeries for the region, have now been centralised to the Regional Hospital and this has caused chaos, according to INMO.
She said: “The closure of 70 acute surgical beds at Ennis and Nenagh hospitals, has contributed to the overcrowding”.
She claims that very inefficient practices at the hospital are adding to the congestion of patients. “There are those coming in for investigations such
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as cat scans, that could be outpatients, but are staying for up to four days, resulting in a shortage of beds”.
The INMO are hoping that the re-opening of 14 beds at St John’s will alleviate some of this pressure.
Ms Fogarty explained: “Twenty-eight beds are currently closed at the hospital, 14 since December 2008, due to lack of funding. We are hopeful that half of these will be re-opened with €600,000 allocated by the HSE”.
Local TD and Labour Health spokesperson Jan O’Sullivan, has called for extra resources to be made available.
She had highlighted problems associated with the reconfiguration of services to the hospital.
“They have reduced the services in the smaller hospitals but did not provide extra resources to the Regional”.
A spokesperson for the HSE indicated that the number of people on trolleys had reduced significantly by midday on Tuesday to 15.
It is believed that the volume of people may be attributable to the number of fractures still being treated following slips and falls.
The spokesperson concluded: “We appeal to the public to recognise the pressure our doctors and nurses are under and to recognise that you may have to wait a little longer while somebody requiring more urgent attention is looked after”.
Work to rule action will involve non-attendance of hospital meetings, non co-operation in the designation of beds for public and private patients and non co-operation with the completion of discharge and census forms.
