134 patients could have died due to trolley wait last month - Regional TD's believe

Up to 134 patients forced to wait more than six to eight hours for admittance to a hospital bed last month may have died as a result of this unacceptable wait.

This highlights the urgent need to take a new approach to the challenges within our health service, says Tipperary Independent TD's Deputy Michael Lowry and Deputy Mattie McGrath - both members of the Regional Group of TDs. 

The group will move a motion in Dáil Éireann on Wednesday morning to seek to overhaul the delivery of pre-hospital emergency care services.

They are calling for better training for staff in schools and childcare facilities, plus an expanded role for paramedics to help reduce the numbers of patients attending Emergency Departments in the first instance, rather than just trying to manage the chaos witnessed in hospitals this year.

This figure of 134 patient deaths is based on the INMO figures. They reveal over 11,000 patients were waiting on trollies for a bed last month.

When taken in tandem with a study just published in the Emergency Medicine Journal, this indicates that for every 82 people forced to wait more than six to eight hours for admittance to a hospital, there is one death above the expected mortality rate. 

Demographics in Ireland are changing and so the Regional TDs believe that healthcare needs to change as well. The recent spike in Emergency Department attendance and ongoing trolley numbers are a symptom of problems in several areas, from Community Health Services to Emergency Services, all of which seem to culminate at Emergency Department doors.

There are also delays in physically reaching the Emergency Department doors.

The National Ambulance Service (NAS) has reported that they are not meeting their Emergency Response target times. In some regions these response times have increased, on average, by 10 minutes since 2019.

Overall, pressures on the NAS are growing. Nearly 2,000 calls to the Service were received per day over December and January, an increase of 19% on the same period last year.

The Regional TDs in their Dáil motion, are seeking investment in terms of staff, equipment and more backup for Community Health Services. 

“Many of us rely on our Ambulance Service in times of medical emergencies, whether it’s a heart attack or stroke in an adult or an allergic reaction or choking incident in a child. We want to specifically reduce the risks in such emergencies”, the group said.

The areas that need urgent action are they say: Provision of more resources for the NAS and recruitment of 1,000 additional staff;  Restructuring of the paramedic function; More supports for paediatric first-aid training in childcare; Establishment and maintenance of a national register of working AEDs; Availability of basic First-Aid equipment and medicine in the community and the creation of a National First Responder register.