Tiny number of beds in Laois and other Midland hospitals on record trolley day in Ireland
Nurses want new mask mandate
The extreme pressure on Frontline staff at Irish hospitals is also being felt in Portlaoise and other midland hospitals as 2023 begins when nurses reported the worst day ever for trollies in Ireland.
On January 3, the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation confirmed that there were 37 people on trollies at hospitals in the Midlands. There were 20 at Mullingar hospital, 12 on trollies in Portlaoise and five in the Tullamore hospital.
Covid-19 figures from hospitals for January 2 show that there were 34 patients with Covid-19 spread across the three hospitals in the Midoc catchement area. Tullamore hospital had 23 patients with the virus while Portlaoise had 6 and Mullingar had five confirmed cases. The Offaly hospital had one critically ill patient with Covid-19.
None of the three hospitals had any ICU beds while just two general beds were available in the Midland Regional Hospital in Portlaoise as of 8am on Monday, January 2.
The regional hospitals in Portlaoise and Tullamore are in the same hospital Group as Naas General. All three are in the Dublin Midland Hospital Group which includes St James's and Tallaght in Dublin.
The INMO revealed that there were 25 people waiting on Tuesday morning in the Naas Emergency Department on trollies. A further four patients were accommodated on trollies giving a total of 29 people waiting.
The January 2 Covid-19 figures for Naas show that 23 patients were positive for the virus. One of these patients is critically ill. the Kildare hospital had one available ICU bed and three free general beds on Monday morning.
St James's had 41 Covid-19 cases when it had three available ICU beds and three general beds. Tallaght had 14 coronavirus patients on January 2 but had no ICU or general beds at 8am.
Nurses reported that St James had 37 trollies in use while Tallaght had 32 trollies deployed for patients on the morning of January 3.
All patients on trollies in Emergency Departments or on wards have been deemed sick enough to require admission. Most of those seen in A&E are discharged.
The INMO said that over 931 patients are without beds in Irish hospitals on January 3 - the highest number of patients that have been without a hospital bed since the trade union began counting trolleys in 2006.
It said 767 patients are on trolleys in emergency departments and 164 are on trolleys elsewhere in hospitals. A total of 26 children have been admitted to hospital without a bed.
INMO General Secretary Phil Ní Sheaghdha said the numbers required immediate and serious intervention from the government.
“We do not need those at the top to describe how we got here; we need to know what exactly the plan is from today until the end of February. Just telling people to avoid hospitals is not a plan or indeed safe. The public need to know exactly what type of care they can expect over the next six weeks.
“Our members are extremely disillusioned by the current set of circumstances they are working in. We are not seeing unsustainable overcrowding confined to a handful of hospitals, each hospital is facing significant overcrowding challenges, a trend which has continued to escalate since late summer. Our members are treating patients in inhumane and often unsafe conditions.
“We need Government to now make difficult decisions including the return of mandated mask-wearing in congregated settings. We know that one of the main pressure points in our health service is the rise of respiratory infections. Asking people to return to mask-wearing in busy congregated settings is a simple measure," she said.
The nursing chief said that over the coming days tangible plans and decisions must be taken nationally to ensure safety in acute public hospitals.