Full-up hospitals to suspend elective operations

Elective surgery in some of the Republic's biggest hospitals was due to be suspended again today despite pressure easing last night on accident and emergency departments.

It is estimated that more than 100 elective operations were cancelled yesterday.

Many hospitals last night said levels of overcrowding would be monitored in coming days and elective surgery would recommence when patient numbers decreased.

Opposition parties said the latest crisis was a result of the failure of Government healthcare policy. Fine Gael's spokesperson on health, Ms Olivia Mitchell, called on the Minister for Health, Mr Martin, to make more funds available to book private nursing home beds.

The current crisis is now an annual one, she claimed. "It is an outrage that there is spare capacity within the health system that is not being utilised because of short-sighted economies."

Labour's spokesperson on health, Ms Liz McManus, said the provision of private beds would alleviate overcrowding and be cost efficient.

"It costs around €1,300 per week to keep a patient in an acute hospital, while a nursing home bed can be provided for around €500 per week. We clearly need a major initiative to provide additional nursing home beds."

As the Labour Relations Commission intervened yesterday to examine staffing issues related to the accident and emergency crisis, hospital consultants last night blamed the Department of Health and health boards for the overflow in hospitals this week.

The Irish Hospital Consultants' Association said if the health boards, particularly the Eastern Regional Health Authority, and the department were more willing to pay to transfer long stay patients to nursing homes, overcrowding in hospitals could be avoided. It said many long stay patients were occupying beds for up to three months when they could be accommodated in nursing homes.

Both the IHCA and the Federation of Irish Nursing Homes claimed up to 250 private beds were available in nursing homes in the ERHA area.

The current crisis could have been avoided if those beds were utilised, the bodies said.

"It is scandalous that we have hundreds of patients in hospital beds who are fit to be discharged but for whom appropriate accommodation cannot be found, while at the same time hundreds of critically-ill patients are inappropriately accommodated on hospital trolleys for days, awaiting admission to a ward," said IHCA secretary general, Mr Finbarr Fitzpatrick.

The FINH accused the ERHA of cancelling contract beds in nursing homes in a bid to cut costs.

However, the ERHA insisted many of the vacant private beds were not suitable for long-stay hospital patients. "The type of services available in private nursing homes and the level of dependency for which they can provide care varies widely," the ERHA said in a statement.

It added there are 1,589 beds partially funded and 1,412 beds fully funded in private nursing homes by the three area health boards in the eastern region.

The ERHA and other health boards around the State last night repeated their request that the public should only visit accident and emergency departments if they required urgent attention.

A special meeting of the Labour Relations Commission will be held later this week to discuss the accident and emergency crisis following a request from the Irish Nurses' Organisation.

The INO said overcrowding in hospitals was dangerous for both staff and patients.

The Irish Patients' Association said the Government needs to revisit proposals for the health service put forward during the Accident and Emergency Forum last year.

Chairman Mr Stephen McMahon said while around 250 new beds had been created in recent months the Government should prepare extra facilities between November and March, when most pressure is on the health service.

"You would have to ask where was the Government's contingency plan?

"It is very disappointing to hear of patients being treated in car parks and having to wait on trolleys for long periods before they get a hospital bed," Mr Mc Mahon said.

SIPTU said there was "absolutely no excuse for the current crisis".

"The reason we have returned to a scenario where patients are sleeping on trolleys in corridors, and even worse, being attended to in the back of ambulances, is because the health boards have not provided funding for 'step down' \ facilities," said National Nursing Official, Mr Oliver McDonagh.

What is needed was a long-term strategy, where funding is used intelligently and is readily available to provide adequate facilities, he added.