€24m A&E at UL ‘won’t help reduce trolley numbers’

The HSE is opening a new €24 million emergency department (ED) at University Hospital Limerick today — but the new facility won’t do anything to reduce the numbers on trolleys at the hospital.

From 8am, the new ED will accept its first patients, resulting in the closure of the current ED that has consistently ranked amongst having the highest numbers of patients on trolleys.

A 2014 report by the Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA) declared it as “not fit for purpose” and said it posed a number of risks to patient safety. The numbers attending have increased by 27.5% between the 51,000 in 2010 and the 65,000 treated there last year.