Thousands of bed days lost as patients kept in

HOSPITALS lost more than 165,000 bed days last year because patients were kept in after they were deemed medically fit for discharge.

A further 85,000 bed days were lost up until May this year, according to figures provided by the Health Service Executive to a Dáil question.

Fine Gael said the Government has “not only broken promises on adding extra beds, it is failing to use existing beds appropriately”.

The Meath West TD, Damien English, who obtained the figures, said the bed days would have gone a long way to accommodate the 230 patients who were left on trolleys each day this year.

The HSE’s Performance Management Unit began collecting the figures for delayed discharges in the country’s 37 acute hospitals at the end of 2006.

Head of the unit, Dr Ciaran Browne, said: “The number of bed days lost is calculated as the number of days spent in the acute hospitals following the date that the patient is deemed medically fit for discharge.”

In 2007, St James’s Hospital in Dublin used 30,000 bed days for patients who no longer needed them and lost 16,000 in the first five months of this year.

St Vincent’s had the second-highest figure on the list with almost 17,000 delayed discharges last year and 5,000 up until May this year.

Cork University Hospital lost almost 12,000 bed days last year and 5,000 up to May 2008.

Mr English said the final figures for this year are on course to be even worse than 2007.

“The 250,000 bed days lost could have accommodated a hell of a lot of the 230 patients on trolleys each day this year, made a big difference to the 21,000 on waiting lists and helped prevent the cancellation of over 7,000 procedures so far this year,” he said.

Mr English said the Government’s “mismanagement” of healthcare would only get worse when spending cutbacks in many areas of State spending began in the next number of months.

“Fianna Fáil is famous for its ability to waste taxpayers’ money and their biggest achievement has been to squander an economic boom,” he said.

“What these bed figures are showing is the impact of the Fianna Fáil Government’s failure to invest taxpayers’ money in essential health services while the coffers were full,” he said.