The number of patients on trolleys awaiting inpatient beds in hospital emergency departments has increased by 35 per cent over the past five years, according to figures produced by the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation (INMO) today.
Following a review of its daily trolley count since 2006 it found the total number of patients who had to wait on trolleys for inpatient beds rose to 75,007 last year, up from 55,720 in 2006.
When former health minister Mary Harney took over responsibility for the health service in late 2004 she promised to put in place a range of measures to deal with the trolley crisis. The INMO said that initially a number of interventions did have a positive impact with the annual total
for numbers of patients on trolleys dropping to 50,402 in 2007 from over 55,000 in 2006.
However each year since then the trolley count has increased. It increased to a total of 59,435 in 2008, to 63,682 in 2009 and to just over 75,000 last year. The phasing out of initiatives which initially had a positive impact on the problem since 2008 had resulted in a steep increase in the level of overcrowding and resulted in 2010 being the worst year on record for trolleys, the INMO said.
The organisation said the trend, in the first weeks of 2011, suggests the problem continues to deepen. It called on all political parties, as the general election approaches, to make a clear declaration on what measures they will introduce within 30 days of being in government to address the crisis.
Liam Doran, general secretary of the INMO, said the election provided an opportunity for all parties to outline exactly what they will do to address what is "as great a national emergency as our economic problems".
He also said the recent announcement that a team of experts had landed in six or seven of the worst affected hospitals to advise on this problem years after it began only added insult to the injury being suffered by patients every day.
"We do not need experts to tell us that we need to open the closed beds, provide nurse led minor injury clinics and additional resources for primary care services in order to deal with this problem," he stated.
He also said the suggestion that extra beds be placed on wards to ease emergency department overcrowding was "a tried, flawed and failed practice of the past which should never be revisited".