Urgent cases lost in 999 call logjam
Doctors finally get protective equipment
DOCTORS across the country are set to be kitted out with much-needed protective gear this week amid complaints that the 999 emergency helpline is being overwhelmed by callers worried they have the coronavirus.
The HSE issued a second tranche of personal protective equipment (PPE) packs to doctors in 3,000 practices across Ireland last Friday, with each containing sanitisers, disposable gowns, surgical masks and gloves.
General practitioners have been working without appropriate protective gear for weeks, and it is understood there are a number of GPs among the healthcare workers who have already tested positive for Covid-19. Doctors’ surgeries stopped taking walk-in appointments last Tuesday, with many reporting that the majority of patient consultations are now taking place by phone.
Monaghan GP Dr Illona Duffy welcomed communication from the HSE late on Friday stating that GPs would be provided with adequate PPE.
‘We received a fax late Friday evening informing us that we will be finally getting our PPE early next week,’ she said. ‘We have been told that it will be on a per-GP basis which is what we had hoped, rather than per practice which is how it used to be sent out and we were left lacking.’
Dr Duffy said GPs had been operating without the necessary protective gear for many days, with out-of-hours services facing acute shortages. She added that over the weekend ‘there was no equipment left in out-of-hours services’, yet GPs ‘were still expected to see patients’.
A HSE spokesperson told the Irish Daily Mail that procurement has been ‘challenging’ but insisted ample equipment would be made available to meet growing demand. ‘HSE continues to procure PPE necessary to deal with Covid-19. The circumstances in which this procurement is being conducted is unprecedented and challenging,’ the spokesperson said.
‘The HSE is satisfied that the arrangements they have in place, and continue to put in place, are adequate to meet the emerging demands.’
Meanwhile, doctors have warned that vital calls to emergency services are being missed as worried callers flood the lines with concerns that they may have the coronavirus.
One doctor who took calls at the National Emergency Operations Centre for the National Ambulance Service (NAS) in Tallaght, Dublin, on Saturday said cases of serious illness or harm are being lost in the backlog, while people cannot reach ambulance services to help with kidney dialysis.
The NAS asked doctors on Friday to help answer 999 calls.
Several doctors, including GPs, interns and hospital doctors, offered to work shifts at the newly established Covid-19 specialist desk at the centre in
Tallaght to determine if callers meet the case definition for testing for the virus.
The HSE issued a statement over the weekend urging the public to reserve 112/999, as well as the HSELive information line and out-of-hours services, for medical emergencies only.
Another HSE official complained that false reports of coronavirus were slowing down the ambulance service.
‘It takes three hours to go to a call, take them to hospital and then disinfect the ambulance after someone has called with suspected coronavirus. People with heart attacks can’t get an ambulance. Every second call now is coronavirus,’ she said.
The HSE official, who works at a health centre in Dublin, said that ambulance crews are becoming emotionally drained as a result of the increased workload.
Public health specialists said helplines were dealing with a deluge of calls from people seeking travel advice. One doctor tweeted that helplines were receiving multiple calls from people asking if they should still go on foreign holidays. Doctors asked members of the public to check the Department of Foreign Affairs website.
People with symptoms meeting the case definition of Covid-19, including fever, chills and/or cough, are being asked to self-isolate before phoning their family doctor to arrange testing. Online referral was made possible over the weekend for GPs who had been reporting long waiting times as they tried to access testing for patients.
Co. Clare GP Dr Liam Glynn said general practice has changed, adding: ‘We are triaging everybody on the phone, so people are speaking to their GP before they see them. This is part of us playing our part in minimising social interactions.’