Surgery cancelled at hospital as nurses step up staffing protest

SURGERY at Our Lady’s Hospital in Cashel, Co Tipperary, will be cancelled today as nurses step up their protest over staffing levels, the Irish Nurses Organisation said yesterday.

From 8.30am today, services at the 70-bed unit will grind to a halt as the 100 nurses in different wards will refuse to communicate with each other. The move means that information on patients coming out from theatre, for example, will not be passed onto wards. The move will force the cancellation of all operations, the INO says. Its members are also refusing to clean special equipment used in stomach operations, again preventing such surgery taking place.

And they have threatened to further step up their action unless the South Eastern Health Board addresses their staffing concerns within a week. Last week, the INO gave the health board seven days of its intention to step up action. Both it and hospital management accept that the 100-nurse unit is short more than 24 nursing posts. Last-ditch efforts to halt the dispute failed yesterday evening.