Naas Hospital does not have adequate staff to cope with the huge numbers of people attending Accident & Emergency services says the Director of the INMO .
Earlier this week, on Tuesday, August 7, there were 25 people lying on trolleys in the corridor while three were waiting on trolleys in a ward.
This announcement comes at the same time that the number of people on waiting lists for various medical procedures has reached almost one million.
Latest available figures for April showed 135,000 people in need of MRIs, ultrasounds and CT scans.
Across the country, Ireland’s emergency departments are at least 216 nurses short of what is needed to care for all admitted patients, according to HSE figures obtained by the INMO at the Workplace Relations Commission on Tuesday.
The INMO says that low pay and bad working conditions make it near-impossible to recruit and retain sufficient nurses in emergency departments.
Across all services, the nursing census shows 2,500 fewer employed nurses and midwives than in 2007, and vacancies are growing.
At a meeting with the HSE at the Workplace Relations Commission yesterday, the INMO demanded immediate talks on curtailment of services to ensure safety of nurses and midwives when at work.
INMO figures for July show that 7,069 admitted patients were on trolleys across Ireland, 21 of them under 16, this is an increase of 11% on last year, and the most overcrowded July since records began.
INMO General Secretary Phil Ní Sheaghdha said:“Overcrowding is now a constant feature of our hospital system, even in summer. Low salaries for nurses and midwives mean that vacancies simply aren’t being taken up and health service capacity can’t grow.”
As of May 2018, 6,118 elderly persons were waiting for Home Support Hours while 3,850 patients were waiting for Assessments of Need under Disability Act in June.
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