Cathal Crowe (Clare, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Okay. We got to that eventually. Is there not a huge risk in that? I was in accident and emergency a few years ago with a concussion on the back of my head and the first 40 minutes or so were spent in triage. It was all questions about date of birth, PPS number and all of those things. If someone is coming in concussed or bleeding heavily from an injury, those initial moments should be spent retrieving a record rather than trying to find out who this person is, where they live, what their PPS number is and who is their next of kin. There is so much time wasted. There is a team dealing with an e-strategy that seems light years away yet there is no information officer in accident and emergency apart from at the reception desk when you are going in. The triage nurse spends way too much time trying to write reams of paper to find out who is this person and what is wrong with them before he or she passes them to the doctors and medical team. Do the officials think there a risk in that? Is there a delay and a risk in accident and emergency in this current system?