Galway nurses protest at hospital hell

Emotional nurses gave tearful accounts of working conditions at the West of Ireland’s biggest Emergency Department to their union leaders before organising a lunch-time protest at the hospital gates in Galway yesterday afternoon.

The members of the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation (INMO) said it was impossible to give optimum patient care while up to 90 patients on average were waiting for admission to the twelve cubicles in the Emergency Department at University Hospital Galway (UHG).

“Even the most caring words are of cold comfort to the patients who have waited an inordinate amount of time to be assessed,” said one INMO member prior to the protest outside the gates of UHG on yesterday (Wednesday).

The protest was staged to highlight “severe overcrowding” at the ED where between 80 and 90 patients are often waiting to be seen by nursing and medical staff.

INMO spokeswoman Clare Treacy said overcrowding at UHG was “unprecedented” in recent weeks and led to fears among staff members over what lay ahead during the winter months.

Ms Treacy has called for an independent report to be carried out by medical professionals in relation to waiting times at the ED. She pointed out that UHG serves a population of 700,000 people in a region which stretches as far north as Co Donegal.

See full story in this week’s Connacht Tribune.