Half of homeless at A&E ‘leave without being fully treated’

The first homeless liaison nurse at one of the country’s busiest hospitals says that half of the homeless people who attended the emergency department in the first four months of this year left before they received full treatment.

Jessica Kenny is the first person to be appointed to the role of homeless liaison nurse at Dublin’s Mater Hospital and she said there has been “a huge amount of presentations” in the first months of this year.

Speaking after she made a presentation to the Mission Awareness Conference, organised by the Mater Hospital, she said work is now under way to determine all the various reasons why homeless people presenting in ED often left before their treatment was completed.