Impact of mental health unit move sees patients left on trolleys at UHG

The HSE West has been described as “heartless, soulless, and emotionless” after the first two patients from the phased out psychiatric unit in Ballinasloe were forced to spend the night on trolleys at University Hospital Galway (UHG) over the past week.

Amid continuing calls for an independent review of the decision to phase out the revamped €3.1 million unit at St Brigid’s Hospital, the first five beds at the 22-bed unit were removed outside of normal working hours last Friday night.

During a briefing by the North / West Hospitals Group on Friday, Cllr Tim Broderick (Independent) told shocked colleagues that the two patients from East Galway had been forced to spend hours on trolleys at UHG’s Emergency Department (ED).

Just this week, the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation revealed that the ED in Galway was the most crowded in the country. They confirmed there were 29 patients on trolleys at UHG from Monday night through to Tuesday morning.

“I wanted to know what happened to the two patients who presented themselves at the Emergency Department over the past week, after being declined admission to St Brigid’s,” said Cllr Broderick.

“You cannot put more psychiatric patients into UHG. There’s no space. They are not ready in there to take psychiatric patients from East Galway and there is no segregation of patients when they arrive. It is a very traumatic experience for psychiatric patients to be admitted to an already busy Emergency Department. It’s frightening, and these patients are being forgotten about.”

Padraig Mulligan of the East Galway Mental Health Action Group said it was a “crazy” decision to transfer unwell psychiatric patients from the Ballinasloe area to one of the busiest EDs in the country.

“They took the beds out of St Brigid’s when most staff members had gone home after work on Friday evening. This was after some general operatives at the hospital had refused to move the beds earlier in the week, but nobody wanted to have a confrontation in front of the patients.”

See full story in this week’s Connacht Tribune.