Almost 100 nursing vacancies but less than half of graduates get jobs

Almost half of the children on hospital trolleys yesterday were waiting more than nine hours for a bed, it has emerged.

A judge is refusing to approve the release of €2,000 from a €10,000 compensation payment to send a six-year-old boy and his six siblings on a holiday to Disneyland.

A 25-hour wait by a 101-year-old Co Clare grandmother on a trolley at the emergency department at University Hospital Limerick (UHL) has been described as "inhumane, deplorable, and disgraceful".

University Hospital Limerick has said it is transferring patients to hospitals in Clare and Tipperary because of a spike in patients attending the Emergency Department.

Health Minister Leo Varadkar has said that up to 200 additional community beds will be opened and staffed by the middle of the month to deal with hospital overcrowding.

As hospitals brace themselves for industrial action, the country’s largest nursing union has called on the public to join in a major protest outside the Dáil today to highlight emergency department (ED) overcrowding.

Increased spending on agency staff and the provision of 41 extra acute beds in Limerick hospitals have been cited as some of the main factors contributing to a €18.5m overspend in a Mid-West group of hospitals.

The shock departure of three registrars from Ennis Hospital has been described as a “crushing blow” for local acute services in the county.

Clerical administrative staff at Ennis Hospital were provided with computer memory sticks to complete their work at home in the evenings and at weekends on an unpaid basis, a nursing union has claimed.

Junior doctors came off gruelling shifts to walk the picket lines outside hospitals across Ireland yesterday.

A patient advocate whose son died because of a series of misdiagnoses, lost opportunities, and inappropriate care has welcomed new national healthcare standards unveiled yesterday.

A WOMAN who had previously received a HSE letter that wrongly stated her husband was dead has now been sent confidential information about a psychiatric patient to whom she was not related.

A GROUP of medical experts from Britain will put Ennis Hospital under the microscope to ensure it meets all the best clinical standards for the introduction of a new life-saving colorectal cancer screening unit.

THE main contractor at a €5.5 million building project at Ennis Hospital has rejected claims some of the construction workers on site are being paid below minimum industry rates.

THERE’S a mystery about the closure of Accident and Emergency services at Roscommon General Hospital.

A MAN, in the throes of a heart attack, left a hospital emergency& department after “several hours” because he could not get attention.

“THERE is no issue around the future of Ennis General and its future is secure.”

THE mid-west Health Service Executive has been requested to suspend the proposed closure of a high-dependency unit at Ennis Hospital on March 1, along with other centralisation proposals, pending the completion of an independent review.

A NEW plan to airlift critically ill patients from isolated parts of Clare for treatment in regional hospitals could substantially improve survival rates, a local accident and emergency consultant has revealed.

PLANNING permission was yesterday granted to the Health Service Executive (HSE) for a €15 million 50-bed extension to Ennis General Hospital.

CONTRACTS for a planned €2.5 million endoscopy unit at Ennis Hospital have been signed.

THE controversial investigation into Mallow General Hospital (MGH), which could result in the facility being severely downgraded or closed, is not based on any formal complaint by patients or medical staff.

TWO families who triggered the independent review of services at the Mid-Western Regional Hospital in Ennis are furious no one has been held accountable.

Minister for Health and Children Mary Harney today said she "strongly welcomed" the report of the Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA) on services at Ennis Hospital.

Ennis General Hospital has been declared unsafe according to a new report from the health watchdog HIQA.

The HSE is advising people to stay away from hospitals across the country unless absolutely necessary due to an outbreak of the winter vomiting bug.

Ennis General Hospital in Co Clare has announced a ban on visitors due to an outbreak of the winter vomiting bug.

Ennis Hospital, which has been dogged by the cancer misdiagnoses controversy of late, has come in second last in an online league of hospitals.

Health Minister Mary Harney is refusing to rule out the possibility that a new investigation of standards at Ennis General Hospital could lead to a downgrading of services.

THE mother of Edel Kelly — the woman who died after her cancer went undiagnosed at Ennis Hospital, Co Clare — has described her hairdresser daughter as her best friend.

IT WAS an entire systems failure that cost Ann Moriarty her life, patient advocate Rebecca O’Malley stressed yesterday.

A PATIENTS’ advocacy group has called for new guidelines on the prevention and control of the potentially fatal superbug Clostridium difficile (C diff) to be made mandatory.

THE MINISTER for Health has described as “serious” the death of 15 patients at a Co Clare hospital following a superbug infection.

Minister for Health and Children, Mary Harney confirmed today that Ennis General Hospital in County Clare is to benefit from a consultant-led Accident and Emergency service but will lose its 24 hour A+E status in the long term.

Minister for Health Mary Harney is being accused of putting lives at risk through plans to downgrade Ireland's smaller hospitals.

Health chiefs will meet today to discuss the launch of a new volunteer hospital patient support group.

ACCIDENT and emergency units at three hospitals in the mid-west are being threatened with closure.

WOMEN who underwent pregnancy tests at three hospitals in the midwest may yet find out they are pregnant despite being told they were not.

Visiting restrictions have been imposed at Ennis General Hospital following an outbreak of the winter vomiting bug.

The Health Services Executive Mid-Western Area has denied claims by a group of hospital consultants that patients are being put at risk because senior management have not adequately responded to the needs of the Mid-Western Regional Hospital in Ennis.

A hard-hitting study offering an alternative to the Government’s Hanly report is to be launched by a health services action group today.