Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

There are 286 patients on trolleys across the country. Despite all the massaging of the figures, the fact is that there was a 2% increase in the number of patients on trolleys last year. The way this problem is being solved by the HSE is that it is sending people messages asking them not to turn up for their elective or day surgery. Time and again, people are ringing every constituency office in the country saying they were called for elective surgery two, three or four times only to have it postponed continually. Is that a way to run the hospitals? What will be done to deal with this issue, as opposed to putting extra beds in the wards? At present, the HSE is just putting extra beds into the wards and stating the patients are not on trolleys anymore. That is not dealing with the issue. One cannot keep postponing elective surgery forever.

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