Some 569 patients are on trolleys in hospital emergency departments today, up from 511 yesterday, which was the highest number ever recorded by the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation (INMO).
The worst-hit hospitals were Cork University Hospital with 48 patients on beds, followed by Beaumont in Dublin with 45 and the Mid-Western Regional in Limerick with 44.
A number of hospitals have had to postpone elective surgery to get to grips with the overcrowding. When there were 495 patients on trolleys in March 2006, Minister for Health Mary Harney declared a national emergency and set up a taskforce to seek solutions.
The INMO said the very high numbers of patients on trolleys waiting for beds was primarily due to more than 1,000 acute hospital beds being closed.
However, the Health Service Executive (HSE) has argued that emergency departments were “busy” largely because of the increase in people suffering with swine flu and other seasonal illnesses. It urged the public to keep emergency departments for emergencies and to contact their GP or out-of-hours GP service.
The HSE reiterated that this year will see the start of its National Clinical Programmes, which will focus on standardising care and introducing solutions to remove waiting lists and trolley waits for patients.
Mr Doran said the 569 figure was equivalent to the number of beds in a large hospital. He blamed political neglect and indifference to maintaining a quality health service and said there was blind adherence to budget limitations regardless of the impact on patient care.
“It is imperative that the Government now reacts to this crisis with the same urgency, and priority, it has given to our economic difficulties and the supposed need of our bankers and saving our banks,” Mr Doran said. “It is time this government looked after ordinary people, many of them elderly, who are facing this indignity, loss of privacy and potential compromising of their health and well-being.
“Saying there is no money and we must do more with less, is cold comfort to the 569 patients and will not address their immediate needs or give them back their dignity,” he said.
The INMO demanded Ms Harney step in and reopen 1,600 closed beds. And it called for community facilities, including public health nursing, to be enhanced to minimise the need for people to be admitted to hospital.
The Department of Health said this evening that hospitals were managing the situation through a range of responses to ensure patients are being treated quickly.
These include the opening of closed beds and the cancellation and deferral of elective procedures.
The department said 23 beds which were closed in Cork University Hospital to facilitate the construction of a new acute medical unit will reopen next week.