FIGURES released by the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation (INMO) this week show that 2,153 patients have been treated on hospital trolleys at University Hospital Limerick across July 2024.
The figures for the same month last year were below this at 1,824.
This July’s figure is more than double that of the next most overcrowded hospital, according on the INMO’s Trolley Watch count, with Galway having 969 admitted patients having to wait on a trolley for an inpatient bed.
Reacting to the stark figures, Deputy Maurice Quinlivan (SF) said that “another unwanted historic milestone was achieved at University Hospital Limerick. This is the highest number of people to be treated on trolleys in a summer month at any hospital in the State.”
“A failure to get to grips with rising hospitalisations puts great strain on the hospital. With capacity being exceeded daily, there is an inevitable knock-on impact on elective procedures both for inpatients and outpatients.”
The Sinn Féin Deputy said that more than 14,000 people have already been treated on trolleys so far this year in UHL.
“These are people who are sick and have been assessed, deemed in need of a hospital, and yet no bed is available for them. Minister Donnelly has had ample time to address this crisis and yet, under his watch, things have only worsened. If these figures continue, we will exceed 28,000 patients on trolleys in 2024.”
The Sinn Féin Deputy hit out that “there is a need to deliver 288 acute inpatient beds at UHL, to deliver 24-hour urgent care at St John’s Hospital, and to make the challenges at UHL a priority at all levels of government”.
In response a spokesperson for UHL said “The improvement of Emergency Department (ED) patient experience is a major priority for the HSE, here in the Midwest and nationally.
“In UHL, the current level of inpatient bed capacity presents a challenge in the face of increases in demand for emergency care. We welcome the Minister for Health’s provision of an additional 382 beds for Mid West in the Acute Inpatient Hospital Bed Expansion Plan. More than two-thirds, 282 beds, of this capacity has been allocated to UHL”.
The spokesperson said that in May 2024, the hospital we stood up a regional Programme Improvement Board to oversee a three-year plan to deliver on a number of other supporting projects and initiatives.
These include an extension to 24/7 opening hours of Medical Assessment Units (MAUs) at Ennis, Nenagh and St John’s from autumn 2024, the opening of an acute virtual ward service, initially for cardiology and respiratory patients (underway) the appointment of an Integrated Patient Flow and Discharge Improvement Lead (complete) and the extension of Safer Staffing to all wards in UHL (underway).
