The father of a five-week-old baby has criticised the state of the health service after he says his child had to spend four days screaming and in pain at a hospital in the northeast while he waited for a bed to become available for him at a children's hospital in Dublin.
Bobby Carroll needed to be transferred from Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital, Drogheda, for surgery.
His father James Carroll, from Ardee, Co Louth, said he was vomiting and passing water through his back passage and his GP referred him to the Drogheda hospital on Monday of last week. Doctors there said he needed to be transferred to Our Lady's Hospital for Sick Children in Crumlin, Dublin, but there was no bed available there for him.
He said the doctors rang Crumlin every day seeking a bed. On Wednesday they were told Bobby was seventh in line for a bed and on Friday morning last, when the child was still in distress and there was no sign of a bed becoming available, he decided he could not wait any longer.
He asked for the child's X-rays and for his drip to be removed and he and his partner, Jennifer Martin, discharged Bobby themselves and brought him to Crumlin by car. He was seen within minutes and was operated on last Saturday. He is recovering well.
"In Drogheda he was red from head to toe from screaming, he was in an awful lot of pain," his father said. "He was in the hospital four days and they could not treat him. It's unreal in this day and age that a five-week-old baby could be left four days in a regional hospital waiting for a bed in another hospital . . . It's horrendous."
He added: "Hospitals are under unbelievable pressure. The health service should be the most important thing on the Government's agenda."
Mr Carroll said regional hospitals such as Drogheda should be resourced to be able to carry out the surgery his baby required.
The Health Service Executive in the northeast said complex paediatric surgery on very young babies was only offered by the three major Dublin paediatric hospitals.
"When a very young baby presents at Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in need of complex paediatric surgery, the paediatric consultant at Our Lady of Lourdes makes contact with the paediatric consultant at one of the Dublin paediatric hospitals to discuss the case and treatment required," it said. "Bed availability at the paediatric hospitals is outside of the control of Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital, Drogheda."
Crumlin hospital stressed that the operation to correct pyloric stenosis (narrowing of part of the stomach), which this child needed, is carried out at all three children's hospitals in Dublin. No effort was made to transfer the baby to Tallaght or Temple Street hospitals.
A HSE spokeswoman said that "given the complexity of the child's needs it was felt by the referring consultant and the receiving consultant that it was best he be dealt with at Crumlin".
Crumlin stressed it "accepts and prioritises all clinical emergencies". Bobby Carroll's condition was not regarded as an emergency, sources at Crumlin said.
Dr David Vaughan, a consultant paediatrician at Our Lady of Lourdes, said the baby may have been in discomfort but was not in danger. "In an ideal world all children would be transferred immediately. Unfortunately as everyone knows sometimes that is not achievable. There are only a certain number of beds."