FOUR EMPTY WARDS – BUT NO ONE TO STAFF THEM
EMMA CULLINAN
AFTER arriving at University Hospital Limerick’s emergency department suffering from severe abdominal pain and vomiting Emma Cullinan was moved from a trolley back to a chair during yesterday’s strike.
The 25-year-old said that despite being told she was being admitted to the hospital after arriving at 2.30am yesterday she was sitting on a chair in the A&E department waiting area ten hours later.
She said she was ‘quickly’ triaged, but spent the rest of her time ‘waiting’. By lunchtime, she had undergone a CT scan.
‘There are people in there since
Patient: Emma Cullinan, 25 Tuesday – I’m lucky,’ she said. ‘They’ve told us we have beds but because the nurses aren’t there to look after them, there’s three or four wards that are empty.’
At time of going to press, UHL had made no official comment.
DECLAN GROEGER
DECLAN Groeger, who has multiple sclerosis, fears his appointment for a catheter change could be cancelled.
The 61-year-old, from Cork, has an appointment next Tuesday when the nurses are due to strike. He is due to fly to Spain the next day. Mr Groeger said because of his MS he is at high risk of urinary tract infection if his catheter is not changed every six weeks.
Speaking to the Irish Daily Mail, he said that if his appointment is cancelled, he will get his catheter changed in a hospital in Spain if needs be.
‘A healthier person might be able to stretch the catheter change to eight or nine weeks but because my immune system is so debilitated I have to do it more often,’ he said.
And he added: ‘I completely support the nurses because they are struggling to give adequate care to patients because they are so short-staffed.’