A LIMERICK teenager spent almost 30 hours on a trolley awaiting admission to the University Hospital in Dooradoyle this week.
The 19-year old was one of many who faced a long wait for admission in a week when the number of patients queueing for beds topped 40 as a display screen in the emergency department informed patients they would have to wait 15 hours to see a doctor.
Ed Gleeson from Mungret accompanied his younger sister to the hospital when she developed severe pain from an infection that was not responding to prescription treatment.
He tweeted a picture of the trolley on which his sister waited for admission on a corridor next to an empty ward.
“I’m not having a go off the staff in the hospital – they did their best but it was almost 30 hours before they found her a bed. She wasn’t at death’s door but she was sick,” he said.
Meanwhile, Sinn Fein election candidate, Maurice Quinliven has slated the failure to tackle the crisis at the emergency department.
Stating that there were between 25 and 42 people waiting for admission between December 29 and January 1, he claimed there was “no progress in reducing the number of patients on trolleys in Limerick.
“In December, the UL Hospitals Group chief executive Professor Colette Cowan said the target of no more than eight patients waiting for admission was achievable. These figures confirm that the situation is only getting worse. This is despite the best efforts of frontline staff who continue to be put under impossible pressure on a daily basis”, he said.
Responding to the criticism, a spokesman for the hospital said that “high volumes of patients presenting at the emergency department resulted in an increase in the numbers waiting for admission.
“In the 24-hour period to 8am on Tuesday, January 5, there were 213 attendances at the emergency department where the average daily attendances are approximately 150.
“As of 12 noon this Tuesday, there were 86 patients in the emergency department and the longest time a person had been waiting to be seen by a doctor was under three hours, with more urgent cases being seen and treated much more quickly”.
“The number of patients waiting in the emergency department for admission at 8am on Tuesday, January 5 stood at 19. In accordance with the UL Hospitals escalation plan, additional patients have also been placed on wards to reduce pressure on the emergency department.
He said that among the measures being taken to relieve pressure are the transfer of suitable patients from UHL to Ennis, Nenagh, St John’s and Croom hospitals and, as a last resort, extra beds will be put on wards.
“For reasons of patient safety, it is preferable to have extra patients on wards rather than in an overcrowded emergency department”, he added.
