Consultants criticise report on A&E

A&E units: Hospital consultants have criticised the Health and Safety Authority (HSA) over parts of its recent report on accident and emergency units around the country.

HSA inspectors examined facilities in accident and emergency units in 11 hospitals around the country in March and April.

The authority subsequently warned about overcrowding in accident and emergency departments and said measures needed to be put in place to deal with inadequate risk assessents, the lack of protection of staff from threats of violence and poor safety training.

The Authority also maintained that a lack of senior clinical cover in accident and emergency departments on a full-time basis had contributed to "a lack of integration of health and safety" and to a "fragmented approach to managing it".

In a letter sent to the Health and Safety Authority earlier in the summer, the Irish Association for Emergency Medicine (IAEM) said that it found the criticism of senior doctors in emergency departments to be "perturbing" for a number of reasons.

The executive committee of the IAEM said that the HSA had no expertise in clinical matters.

"No emergency medicine consultant at any of the departments referred to in your report was asked about or requested to provide details of senior clinical cover/rota arrangements at any stage by your inspectors. It is factually incorrect to state that there is no senior clinician in charge of emergency units 24/7," the IAEM stated.

The Association also maintained that it was unaware that any inspectors from the HSA visited emergency departments out of normal working hours "to observe the alleged contribution to the present crisis being created by the assumed lack of senior cover at those times".

The IAEM said that it requested the HSA to provide facts to substantiate the claim that there was no senior clinician in charge of emergency units on a 24/7 basis and to support the observation that a lack of senior clinical cover contributed to a lack of integrated health and safety and a fragmented approach.

Hospitals inspected by the HSA were: Beaumont, the Mater and Connolly hospitals in Dublin; Naas General;, St Joseph's Clonmel; Our Lady of Lourdes in Drogheda; Wexford General; Mercy Hospital, Cork; Limerick Regional; Sligo Regional; and University College Hospital, Galway.