33 waiting for beds in Drogheda Hospital as HSE appeal to the public to "consider all options" before attending EDs

Thirty three were waiting for a bed in the Emergency Department of Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital, Drogheda this morning according to the Irish Nurses & Midwives Organisation Trolley Watch.

It comes as almost 931 admitted patients wait for beds at hospitals nationwide today, 767 of whom are on trolleys in emergency departments with 164 on trolleys elsewhere. 

The HSE has issued an appeal to people seeking medical care or assessment to consider all options before going to a hospital Emergency Department, during what is going to be one of the busiest ever periods experienced by the health service. 

They did however add that:

“While some patients will regrettably experience long wait times in our Emergency Departments, urgent patients will always be prioritised for treatment and care.”

According to Damien McCallion, the HSE’s Chief Operations Officer:

“As expected, Emergency Departments are becoming extremely busy due to the unprecedented combination of very high levels of flu, COVID-19 and other respiratory illnesses in the community.

"Those who believe they may be seriously ill and require emergency care should of course come to hospital, but we would urge others to consider seeking support from pharmacists, GPs, GP Out of Hours Services and Minor Injury Units. These services have emergency responses in place for patients presenting with respiratory and other urgent health issues.”

"The appeal comes as Covid-19 and influenza cases continue to increase rapidly. Notifications of RSV, which had been declining for several weeks, are also now increasing. Unfortunately, we expect this incline to remain sharply upwards for a number of weeks to come and to continue to seriously impact our hospitals and Emergency Departments.

"While this surge of winter virus infections was predicted and planned for, the trends being seen are following the more pessimistic of predicted models, and also appear to be increasing earlier than had been hoped."

INMO General Secretary Phil Ní Sheaghdha said the numbers "require immediate and serious intervention from the government". 

She said:

"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."