Woman, 91, had to wait four hours in an ambulance and further 49 hours on a trolley
FIGURES from the Irish Nurses Medical Organisation (INMO) show how numbers on trolleys at the hospital have peaked at 57 and 56 on consecutive days.
The figures from the INMO, he said, speak for themselves: September 13, 57 people waiting on trolleys or in beds elsewhere (44 on trolleys/13 elsewhere); September 14, 56 people - (45/11); September 15, 48 people - (36/12). On Monday last there were 43 people waiting on trolleys or in beds elsewhere (23/20), this figure fell to 30 on Tuesday and yesterday, Wednesday, September 21, it climbed again to 37.
“The main issue is a lack of staff and available hospital beds. The majority of patients on trolleys are admitted as patients with no beds on the wards available.
“I was told from the HSE in August 2021 that we were awaiting the go ahead for the new 42 bed medical block unit, we still are no further on and not clear of any timeline for procurement,” he said.
“Nurses and staff continue to fight through what is simply a system that is broken. Lack of staff, lack of clinical space, lack of beds for admissions and an emergency department that is seeing an historic number of patients. And what worries me is that this is likely to increase year on year as our population ages,” he said. Earlier this year Fiona Mc Daid, Emergency Nurse Specialist in the HSE carried out an assessment of the Emergency Department. The report “clearly stated the Department was understaffed and it was her opinion that the emergency department is outdated and not reflecting current requirements for patient flow, observation and monitoring.”
He said he had been informed that there were only seven nurses in the emergency department one day last week with one of these staff nurses assigned to oversee 18 patients who “were residents of the hospital corridor”.
He added: “If we compare this by the hospital’s own standards of a fully staffed Oncology ward of 18 patients, CCU with capacity of 12 patients and Medical 5 with capacity of 15 patients it is clear we are in a worsening situation.”
“In the short term we need more beds and more staff. I have no doubt that we must look at taking over beds in the private health care system. Longer term we need a clear strategy for our health service,” he told the Sligo Weekender. “The primary care system is invisible. We lack the local first point of call as people are finding it more and more difficult to access a GP.
“We need to urgently invest in our hospital infrastructure.
“Our long awaited new 42 medical block has been at final stage design for so long now I cannot recall. Our emergency department in Sligo was opened in 1991 and it is not fit for the number of patients attending the department on an annual basis and whilst we have invested close to 5 million euro in a modular unit, it is clear this is having little impact on patient care.
“Surely it’s now time to listen to those who know best - the staff, the patients, those on the hospital corridors.”