This isn’t a normal First World country

Some of the article:

“The extreme pressure on emergency departments means it is not uncommon for patients to be waiting 80 to 90 hours for a bed and in one case it took as long as 116 hours, a watchdog report warned today.

The report from the Health Information and Quality Authority (Hiqa), which follows a series inspections of emergency departments, found conditions compromise the dignity and respect of patients and poses a risk to their health and safety.

In five of the emergency departments inspectors were not satisfied that effective management arrangements were in place to provide safe services.

University Hospital Limerick and Mayo University Hospital failed in three of four standards while Cork University Hospital was not compliant in one standard.

Cavan and St Michael’s Hospital were partially compliant and St Vincent’s Hospital was fully compliant.

A shortage of nurses was a problem across several hospitals and one was down by more than a third.

Hiqa said the Irish health system is under unprecedented strain as it continues to see an increasing number of patients presenting to emergency departments which is significantly higher than in previous years.

These issues include ineffective patient flow, limited bed capacity, reduced access to community services and insufficient staffing levels, which continue to cause overcrowding in Irish emergency departments.”

4 comments

  3. > ineffective patient flow

    Example of this from last week: I have my two kids on my private insurance plan, so that I don’t have to keep waiting in A&E. Took them to the Laya private clinic last week. We were promptly seen, the kids were diagnosed, a report was written, and we were told to take the report to A&E because they could not issue prescriptions. So, we went to Temple Street, where a triage nurse promptly saw us, took the report and sent us to a waiting room, which got eventually overcrowded to the point where people were sitting on the floor. We waited for 9 hours to see a doctor, who read the report, wrote the required prescription and sent us home.

    I can immediately spot some inefficiencies. First of all, if no examination is needed, perhaps reports from other professionals could be prioritised. This would reduce the load on the waiting rooms. Second, we were led inside, and each of the two kids got assigned a bed. These beds had to be cleaned after we left, before new patients were admitted. If everyone needs to be assigned a bed, regardless what the triage nurse finds, it’s no wonder that the patient turnover is so slow. I’ve seen people from our waiting room go inside and be back out in 5 minutes, but it may have taken twice as long or even longer to prepare the bed for the next patient. Perhaps having a doctor in an office who’d see patients that don’t require a bed would speed up the turnover.

  4. Been there, spent 4 days in A&E a few years ago. There was absolutely no reason I should have been in A&E – twas an awful experience with all the drunkards and people with gory injuries. Meanwhile I was stuck there just receiving some IV antibiotics.

    The answer is to develop secondary care centers and home care so the ward beds by long term stays can be reduced (a shit ton of these beds are occupied with alcoholics and geriatric patients who would be better served in a minimally monitored care home than a hospital.

    And here is the kicker – those options are significantly cheaper! pretty much everything is when compared to having people in hospital.

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