24 Jan 2017, 12:12
24 January 2017
The Joint Committee on Health will tomorrow conduct a two-part meeting to consider the issue of overcrowding at hospital emergency departments. In Session A the Committee will meet with representatives from the Irish Association of Emergency Medicine, the Irish Congress of Trade Unions and Patient Focus. In Session B the Committee will hear from representatives of the Health Service Executive.
Session A will commence at 1.30pm in Committee Room 3 tomorrow, Wednesday, 25 January 2017 and Session B will follow at 3.00pm.
Committee Chairman, Dr. Michael Harty TD, said “January 2017 saw the number of patients in Emergency Departments waiting on a hospital bed reach record highs. These record numbers have a direct impact on patient safety, cause prolonged acute admissions and had the effect of cancelling elective admissions leading to longer waiting lists. These are matters which the Committee are keen to address. We welcome the opportunity to meet with these constituent groups tomorrow in order to assess how we reached this figure, what impact it has on patients and staff and how we can avoid such a spike in the future.”
“Winter time is a predictably busy time in hospital ED’s however delays and overcrowding are now a year round occurrence. Bed capacity, staff recruitment, access to diagnostics and integration of services are critical issues which need to be explored. While temporary measures were put in place following a particularly busy period at the start of January, such as access to transitional care beds and acute hospital beds, we must assess the ability of our health service to meet demand in the long term, not least during these peak times.”
Committee proceedings can be viewed live here.
Committee proceedings can also be viewed on the move, through the Houses of the Oireachtas Smartphone App, available for Apple and Android devices and on Facebook Live.
Ends