Desperate patients leave A&E

Thousands not formally discharged

A RECORD number of patients are walking out of emergency departments without being discharged and without getting treatment.

More than 13,500 people simply abandoned their visit to A&E during January of this year and December last.

Nearly one in 16 patients who arrived seeking emergency medical care left instead, either frustrated by lengthy queues, going elsewhere for treatment, or going home.

THE number of patients walking out of emerg e ncy departments without ever being formally discharged has reached record levels.

More than 13,500 people simply abandoned their visit to A&E during January of this year and December last.

It means that nearly one in 16 patients who arrived seeking emergency medical care left instead, either frustrated by lengthy queues, going elsewhere for treatment, or returning home.

The figures for January 2018 and December 2017 include 859 children, whose parents thought they were sick enough to bring to hospital but later left without officially being told they were healthy enough to go. In a statement, the HSE said there were a variety of reasons why patients might leave an emergency department, not only wait times.

However, the numbers have been climbing during precisely the same period as waiting lists in Irish hospitals reached their highest levels yet.

In January, 6,499 people were classified as ‘did not waits’ compared to 4,777 people in the same month in 2017.

The figure was actually even worse in December when 7,055 people – or 6.3% of all patients presenting – went home without formal discharge from hospital. There has been a steady rise in the percentage of patients not waiting for emergency treatment, from 4.8% in January 2017 to 6% and above in the two most recent months for which figures are available.

The number of patients abandoning their A&E visit was highest in three Dublin hospitals: t he Mater, St James’s, and Tallaght. At the Mater Hospital, the total number of ‘did not waits’ in January reached 1,292, which made up 19.8% of the national total.

Overall, it meant that nearly one in five people who presented at the Mater Hospital did not stay around for their treatment to be finished. Very high rates for ‘did not waits’ were also recorded at Tallaght (17.8%) and St James’s Hospital (16.6%) in January.

Outside of Dublin, the highest number of patients leaving was recorded at University Hospital Limerick (341) and Our Lady of Lourdes in Drogheda (307). However, the ‘did not wait’ percentage at both hospitals was 5.7%, just below the national average.

In Cork, 206 people left the A&E of the Mercy University Hospital in January without being medically cleared, which was 7% of the number of patients seeking treatment.

Over the course of 12 months, more than 72,000 patients presented at an emergency department and were then classified as ‘did not wait’, the figures released under FOI show. Of that total, 3,420 had been seeking treatment at one of the three children’s hospitals in Dublin: Crumlin, Temple Street, and Tallaght.

In a statement, the HSE said: ‘Due to the unplanned nature of patient attendance, the department must provide initial treatment for a broad spectrum of illnesses and inju- ries, some of which may be life-threatening and require immediate attention. Triage is the process of determining the priority of patients’ treatments based on the severity of their condition.

‘Triage may result in determining the order and priority of emergency treatment, the order and priority of emergency transport, or the transport destination f or t he patient. Patients that choose to leave before receiving treatment in an emergency department do so for a variety of reasons, i ncluding receiving treatment elsewhere, their issue being resolved, wait times and an improvement in condition.’

The HSE said high figures in central Dublin were partly due to higher rates of deprivation, addiction and ‘comorbidity challenges’ (one or more additional disorders) all of which were above national average.

Variety of reasons 72,000 patients ‘did not wait’