Hospital management covering-up overcrowding crisis - consultant

A consultant at Ireland's largest acute care hospital, St James’ in Dublin, has accused management of trying to cover up its chronic overcrowding problems.

Dr Patrick Plunkett says he was the doctor who put the hospital's emergency plan in place last week, despite earlier claims from hospital management that the procedure had not been invoked.

On Friday, a spokesperson for the hospital dismissed claims from the Irish Nurses' Organisation that a major incident plan had been invoked.

The emergency plan, which is designed to deal with large-scale disasters and chronic overloading of services, meant that consultants who were off duty or from other departments were called in to treat casualty patients on Thursday.

Dr Plunkett says that management’s denial that the plan was used is an attempt to "hoodwink the public and to downplay the seriousness of the situation".