ALL HOSPITALS in the State have been urged to stop using hospital corridors to accommodate patients following a damning report which found the practice was putting lives at risk.
An investigation by the Health Information and Quality Authority has severely criticised Dublin’s Tallaght hospital for its “persistent tolerance” of leaving patients on trolleys for long periods.
Other hospitals were also struggling to deal with overcrowding, the report found. On a single day in August last year, an audit by the authority found 24 out of 25 emergency departments failed to meet targets for waiting times. A further nine hospitals failed to provide any data.
The patient safety watchdog conducted a year-long investigation into the running of Tallaght hospital after an inquest into the death of patient Thomas Walsh (65), who died on a corridor while waiting for a bed.
The report’s 76 recommendations – which include stopping the use of hospital corridors for patients across the State and greater oversight of spending – will pose significant challenges for many hospitals, many of which are regularly battling overcrowding.
Yesterday, for example, there were 296 patient on trolleys awaiting treatment, according to Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation.
Minister for Health James Reilly yesterday accepted the report’s findings and said he planned to call in the heads of all the acute hospitals in the State to examine how they intended to implement the recommendations.
However, he said no extra money would be made available to address issues such as hospital overcrowding.
“Money is going to be needed in the system and it is going to come from within the system, from all the inefficiencies that are there at the moment,” he said.
Dr Reilly said he hoped that by the end of the year, there would not be any patients on trolleys in corridors anywhere in the State. In addition, he pledged that by the end of the year there would be a “six-hour real time patient experience” in 95 per cent of cases in emergency departments.
The Department of Health’s chief medical officer has referred the report to the Medical Council and An Bord Altranais, which regulate the medical and nursing professions.
“It is completely unacceptable that there was no clarity as to who was providing medical supervision of these patients. For that reason the chief medical officer has referred the report to the Medical Council and An Bord Altranais to ask them to address the significant issues that arise here,” the Minister said.
The authority’s chief executive, Tracey Cooper, said the report showed evidence of a “persistent, and generally accepted”, tolerance of patients lying on trolleys in corridors for long periods. “This puts patients at risk, is not acceptable and should not be tolerated in any hospital in Ireland,” she said.
Among the report’s main findings on Tallaght were that:
more than 80 per cent of patients who needed admission were kept on a trolley in a corridor next to the emergency department;
there was a lack of clarity over who was clinically responsible for patients left in corridors;
the hospital paid €1.8 million for a consultant’s report on reform of the hospital, with no evidence that quotations were sought from other interested parties. This occurred at a time when it was carrying over a deficit of more than €20 million;
there was no evidence available for why the board decided to authorise supplementary payments worth up to €150,000 for senior staff taking on additional roles, and
the HSE was failing to hold the hospital to account on how almost €190 million of taxpayers’ money was spent.
Dr Cooper indicated if people in mangement positions were not up to the job they should be retrained, offered other jobs or have their employment terminated. She confirmed a number of concerns in relation to spending at Tallaght hospital had been referred to the Comptroller Auditor General.
Though the recommendations and findings in the report were made by a statutory body, it is understood they do not leave hospitals open to legal action by patients if they are not implemented.
