Hospital still in crisis after Róisín’s death

Catherine Shanahan

Our Lady’s Hospital for Sick Children, Crumlin, Dublin, has funding for 124 ICU nurses but has a staff of just 91. Last night, the hospital revealed a total of 55 cardiac operations were deferred last year, 18 because of inadequate staffing levels and one because there was no intensive care nurse.

Yesterday, an independent report into the death of two-year-old Róisín Ruddle was severely critical of management for failing to address an anticipated shortage of paediatric intensive care nurses. Róisín was discharged from the country’s leading children’s’ hospital on June 30, 2003 because of the nursing shortage. The report found Róisín would have had a greater chance of survival if the surgery had gone ahead. She died at her home in Ballingarry, Co Limerick on July 1, the day after being discharged from Crumlin.