Members of the public are being urged to come out on the streets to express anger at the state of the health service.

I WRITE in the wake of the uncertainty surrounding the exclusion of oncologist John Crown from the Late Late Show panel.

A BAN on staff recruitment to the health service is to continue for the month of November, the Health Service Executive confirmed last night.

EMERGENCY medicine doctors have claimed conditions in hospital A&E departments are returning to crisis point.

A major maternity hospital is being forced to rent hotel rooms for pregnant women because of a lack of beds.

The Patients Together lobby group is demanding that the Government urgently review the co-location scheme, saying it has uncovered evidence of fraud.

A NEW online ‘rate my hospital’ service which allows patients and their relatives to comment on their local facilities, was welcomed by patient campaign groups yesterday.

The lobby group Patients Together has criticised the Government over delays in planned developments at two hospitals in Mullingar and Dublin.

SERIOUSLY ill people waiting days on trolleys in overcrowded A&E units cannot be heard when they cry out for help, a patients’ lobby group has claimed.

NURSES are set to stage a series of strikes from next month over the Government’s failure to tackle the accident and emergency crisis.

The crisis in hospital A & E departments comes under the spotlight again this afternoon as the Patients Together group and members of the Labour Party protest outside Dublin's Mater hospital.

PATIENTS will be charged up to €200 to attend the country’s first private casualty department which opens on Monday.

NURSES are threatening to take industrial action unless Health Minister Mary Harney resolves the A&E crisis.

LOBBYISTS campaigning against the downgrading of small hospitals are considering entering an alliance with new patients’ group Patients Together.

THE Irish Nurses Organisation have rejected a claim made by a senior Accident and Emergency consultant that its policies were putting patients at risk.

The Patients Together lobby group has accused the Government of failing to recognise the drastic effects that bed shortages are having on patients.

A new patients' representative group, Patients Together, will take to the streets of Dublin today to demonstrate over conditions at A&E departments across the country.

ELLEN COGAVIN was a Fine Gael candidate in the Dunshaughlin area for Meath County Council in last June’s local elections. She is a senior nurse in a nearby hospital and health was probably one of the issues she campaigned on.

Minister for Health Tánaiste Mary Harney has warned that there are no quick-fix solutions to the overcrowding crisis in A&E departments.

SPENDING on health will be substantially increased next year, Tánaiste and Health Minister Mary Harney told a meeting of accident and emergency nurses yesterday.

The "Patients Together" group is to stage a protest in Dublin today to highlight the ongoing A&E crisis in Irish hospitals.

ACCIDENT and emergency departments at some of the country’s biggest hospitals reported an easing off in the beds crisis over the bank holiday weekend.

HEALTH Minister Mary Harney has disputed a claim made by a new patients' lobby group that the Government has closed 400 hospital beds.