94 year old great grandmother spends 50 hours on A&E trolley

Date Published: 16-Jun-2010

A 94 year old great grandmother from Clifden was forced to spend 50 hours on a trolley in the corridors of the Accident and Emergency Department of University Hospital Galway because of the continuing chronic overcrowding problem at the city hospital.

The family of Betty Mullen, a widow of seven, a grandmother of 32 and a great grandmother of 34, has described the pensioner’s trolley ordeal as “shocking” and a “disgrace”.

Ms Mullen was brought to the A&E Department of UHG at 2pm last Tuesday and was not given a bed until shortly after 4pm on Thursday – two nights and 50 hours later.

Ms Mullen was forced to spend one night on a trolley out in the public corridors of A&E among scores more patients on Tuesday.

And on Wednesday she was brought into a room at the end of the corridor of A&E where she and five or six other patients remained on trolleys for the night.

Her daughter, Rita, told the Connacht Tribune that it is shocking that wards and beds are closed at the hospital while elderly people like her mother have to suffer two nights on a trolley.

See full story in this week’s Connacht Tribune.