Hospital staff worried about A&E move

STAFF at St
Columcille’s Hospital in Loughlinstown have questioned the transfer of
emergency services to another hospital.

In June the HSE
said the accident and emergency (A&E) service at Loughlinstown would close
between the hours of 8am and 8pm from this November.

Patients in the
hospital’s catchment area who need emergency care during those hours will
instead be transferred to St Vincent’s Hospital.

However, an
employee of the Heath Services Executive (HSE) who works at the Loughlinstown
hospital, told Southside People that the A&E ward at St Vincent’s Hospital
had been closed on several occasions over the course of a recent weekend.

She claimed the
temporary closures at the A&E ward were due to the department’s inability to
cope with the volume of attendances.

Management at St
Vincent’s Hospital has admitted that its A&E department has been under
severe pressure recently and that they had been forced to open beds that were
closed by the　HSE due to funding restrictions.

AS a result staff
at Loughlinstown Hospital say they are worried about the proposed move of
A&E services to St Vincent’s Hospital.

“The
emergency department at St Vincent’s goes off call and that means that they
have an extreme workload when they have too many patients in,

“They
close the A&E for two hours because they are only allowed to close it for
two hours at a time. That has happened a lot lately.”

A spokesman for St
Vincent’s Hospital said they had been under considerable pressure over the last
few weeks.

“The hospital has taken
a number of measures to alleviate the situation including opening up beds that
had been closed for financial reasons.”

Deputy Richard
Boyd Barrett (PBP) is leading a
campaign against the closure of out of hours emergency services at
Loughlinstown Hospital.

He asked Health
Minister James Reilly in a parliamentary question recently to provide full
details of any existing plans to reduce services at the hospital.

“It is clear
that although no date has been given, the question has not been answered,

?

In response to
Deputy Boyd Barrett’s parliamentary question Minister Reilly said: “The
HSE is currently carrying out a collaborative study and consultation process
across the two sites.

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A spokeswoman for
the HSE added they would liaise closely with clinicians and management in the
hospitals, regional management, the Minister for Health and Department Of
Health prior to any decisions being taken.