I could do f ive of these surgeries a day; instead I have to go home early
As the trolley crisis again broke all records this week, one orthopaedic consultant makes an astonishing admission...
A HOSPITAL surgeon, whose operations have been repeatedly cancelled, says the Government ‘doesn’t give a damn’ about people living in chronic pain.
Peter O’Rourke, an orthopaedic surgeon, says the Government and HSE are only concerned with cancer patients because they are the ones who will ‘make it on to the front of the newspaper if their treatment is delayed’.
Mr O’Rourke, who works in Letterkenny General Hospital in Donegal, says he has 130 patients, many of whom are elderly, awaiting mostly hip operations.
However, the hospital emergency escalation plan, which puts elective surgery on hold while the HSE attempts to free beds to ease the A&E crisis, means these patients must wait up to two years for their operations.
Dr O’Rourke frequently goes home early because there’s nothing for him and other consultants to do. He says: ‘The whole thing is a mess and the so-called “solutions” that Simon Harris is coming up with are making it worse.
‘There isn’t a crisis in A&E; there’s a crisis in getting people out of A&E. For too long, the health service has pumped money into getting more staff into the emergency departments.
‘They should really be spending funds on providing beds for them to move on to after they leave A&E. I have elderly patients suffering and there’s nothing I can do about it. There are no beds for them. I operated yesterday on a patient who’s been waiting two years for their hip operation.
‘If you don’t have cancer, then the health service isn’t really interested in you.’
Mr O’Rourke’s views echo those of many surgeons across the country, who have been blocked from carrying out their normal surgeries for several months because of the deal agreed to cancel the admission of waiting-list patients when the number of people waiting on trolleys has reached a certain level.
This week, the number of people on hospital trolleys reached a record high at 714.
At the same time, the latest figures show that nearly 80,000 people are waiting for operations within the health service, while 500,800 are awaiting outpatient treatment in hospitals.
Mr O’Rourke says the situation is ‘extremely frustrating’.
‘I could do five of these operations a day; instead I’m having to go home early. People are being rung the night before their operation and told “sorry it’s off’’.
The surgeon says the Government’s focus on ‘pouring money’ into private hospitals has not helped. ‘You have the private hospitals jumping up and down wanting to help when there’s a crisis. The fact is most patients don’t want to go to private hospitals located, in some cases, hundreds of kilometres from where they live. What happens if there’s a complication in the weeks or months after their surgery?
‘They don’t give a damn about people in pain’
‘Patients suffering and there’s nothing I can do’
‘And the more the Government relies on the private sector, the more public hospitals will lose much-needed staff to these hospitals. We’re seeing it already.’
Commenting on the cancellation of operations, the HSE told the Irish Mail on Sunday this week that, while the situation is ‘far from ideal’, consultants are focusing on out-patient services.
‘Following on from Storm Emma the focus has been on getting services back up and running and implementing a recovery plan.
‘In relation to the cancellation of elective surgery, hospitals will be looking at a rescheduling plan from next week. The HSE will be working closely with the hospitals.’
DO YOU think we will see a week any time soon that will not be overshadowed by another scandal in the charity sector? This week it was the turn of Our Lady’s Hospice in Harold’s Cross to apologise for misuse of fundraising money. But let’s not be too quick to decry charities that are doing their best in difficult circumstances.
As we mark our national holiday this weekend, we should remember that Ireland can still hold its head high when it comes to charity, at home and abroad.
One Irish charity can fairly lay claim to keeping the horrific Chernobyl nuclear explosion 32 years ago on the international agenda is Chernobyl Children International.
Indeed, it was a speech to the UN by CCI founder Adi Roche that led directly to the designation of April 26 as an annual Remembrance Day. Adi Roche – a long-time campaigner against nuclear weapons – was the first person to organise international humanitarian convoys to Chernobyl in the aftermath of the power plant explosion.
As we know the then Soviet state tried to hide the impact of the world’s worst nuclear accident, so we can imagine the courage of campaigners like Adi Roche and Ali Hewson as they committed themselves to helping the victims.
Thirty-two years later, Ireland is still the lead country when it comes to aiding Chernobyl victims. More than 25,000 of them have been brought to Ireland by CCI for medical, mental and social assistance.
Over €100m has been raised by the charity, and the latest project is organising life-saving operations for a condition called ‘Chernobyl heart’, a congenital condition that requires open heart surgery.
After she finished a powerful and extraordinarily moving speech at a fundraising event last weekend, somebody remarked that Adi Roche – who has never taken a salary – should stand for president. But she did stand for Áras an Uachtaráin 1997 and was so horribly treated that I doubt if she would want to repeat the exercise. Adi – who was never a member of a political party – proved that unless you are deeply embedded in the political system you will not get next nor near the Presidency. Yes, Adi did receive the support of Labour, Democratic Left and the Green Party – but Mary McAleese, the eventual winner, and the other candidate Mary Banotti, had the total support of behemoths Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael.
In truth, Adi didn’t have a hope despite her credentials.
She and her family were treated horribly and she lost badly. To use that old political phrase from across the water, she wasn’t ‘one of us’.
Gay Byrne – another political outsider – was about to meet the same fate before he wisely abandoned notions of the Presidency back in 2011. We forget that as well as salaries, expenses and generous pensions, the Irish taxpayer hands over €13m directly to political parties to help to fund their day-today campaigning.
The irony of one political party holding a slick media event with professional banners and posters complaining about the Government use of taxpayers’ money on political spin jumps out when one remembers that both campaigns are funded by taxpayers.
Political high office is not the beall and end-all of achievement, as the wonderful Adi Roche proves powerfully again and again.