Fire safety officer sent to UHL amid overcrowding concerns in A&E

Wed, 04 Jan, 2023 - 19:33

Daniel McConnell and Niamh Griffin

Limerick fire department is so concerned about the impact of overcrowding at University Hospital Limerick (UHL) that it has sent in an inspection team.

A spokesman for Limerick councils confirmed: “Limerick City and County Council can confirm that a Fire Officer carried out an inspection at the Emergency Department of the University Hospital Limerick on Tuesday January 3, 2023, and that we are awaiting their final report”.

The report is expected to be shared publicly when it is complete.

The hospital, whose management have stated they simply do not have enough hospital beds to cater for an “unprecedented” high number of emergency patients, has now cancelled many elective operations for this week.

“These measures follow an unprecedented level of ED attendance driven by a surge in patients with respiratory infections, including Covid-19, flu and RSV,” a spokesman said.

“We apologise to every patient who is currently experiencing a long wait for admission at UHL, and for the inconvenience and frustration this causes for patients’ loved ones.”

The number of people lying on trolleys waiting to be treated in hospitals is to remain “at high levels” for the rest of the week, the Cabinet has been told.

Hospital consultants have also been asked to work late nights and on weekends outside their normal rostered hours in a bid to ease the pressure on the system.

Ambulance staff have also been asked to come forward to work overtime by their bosses in a bid to manage the crisis.

Ministers at their first Cabinet meeting of the new year were briefed on the situation in hospitals across the country by Health Minister Stephen Donnelly, who painted a grim picture.

He gave an update on numbers in hospital with flu, covid, and RSV in the lead-up to Christmas week. Flu cases are much higher than previous years.

Up to a Christmas week, 2,331 laboratory-confirmed cases of flu were identified compared with about 1,000 cases in the same period in 2019, the last year before the pandemic hit. Of these, 637 were hospitalised compared to 350 in 2019.

Ministers were told Covid hospitalisations have remained high but relatively stable, as are RSV cases.

Mr Donnelly explained a significant increase in presentations to emergency departments has come from older patients.

The 191,038 over 75s attending EDs up to the week before Christmas represented a 14% increase on 2019 levels.

Mr Donnelly told colleagues he had ordered measures to optimise patient flow, with dedicated patient flow coordinators to manage discharged patients.

Increased funding

He has sanctioned increased funding for GP out-of-hours services.

An agreement to provide extended GP sessions in the evenings and weekends has also been secured.

Expanded opening hours for minor injury units to reduce demand on emergency departments have commenced, as well as enhanced GP access to diagnostics.

Mr Donnelly has also called for an enhanced presence of senior clinical decision-makers in hospital settings to accelerate access to intervention and ultimately discharge, as well as an increased use of overtime.

Hospitals will be asked to curtail elective activity and adding surge capacity safely where possible, and hospitals partnering with private hospitals will access additional beds for urgent or emergency admissions.

The minister also asked the HSE to source all available capacity from private hospitals — including beds and diagnostics.

It is unacceptable that ill patients are being left for hours or overnight on trolleys, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has said.

The Taoiseach said there were still a lot of patients not getting the dignity they deserve during their stay in hospital.

Mr Varadkar said it was not acceptable to have so many patients on trolleys, but since Covid arrived in 2020 there are 1,000 more beds and 6,000 more doctors and nurses.

Huge jump in cases of Covid and flu in week before Christmas