Marian Harkin (Sligo-Leitrim, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Do we get extra time here or do we just keep going?

Just over six months ago 50 consultants from Sligo University Hospital, wrote to the Minister for Health to highlight the severe pressure being experienced at Sligo University Hospital. Just one sentence from that letter basically says it all. It sates, "We have never seen the demand on our services so high nor the morale of our staff so low." According to the consultants there, Sligo University Hospital routinely has hospital bed occupancy over 110% often with 30, 40 or 50 admitted patients without a bed. They say this is an everyday occurrence. For the record, today there are 45 patients on trolleys at Sligo University Hospital and that is in the middle of May. It is the third highest in the country.

Sligo University Hospital is almost always in the top five - or the worst whichever way we want to look at it - when it comes to numbers on trolleys and today it is in the top three. Unfortunately, the critical situation at Sligo University Hospital is simply a microcosm of what is happening in the entire Saolta region comprising Donegal, Sligo, Leitrim, Roscommon, Mayo and Galway. The Irish Hospital Consultants Association has issued a statement this week which follows a similar statement last year, except this year the statement is worse. This time we have a statement from a national organisation not just from the consultants at Sligo University Hospital. They have said that patient health in the west and north west is at risk due to excessive delays to care. They are singling out that region, the Saolta region, and this is what they are saying.

They quote a raft of statistics to make their argument and some of those statistics are really frightening. They look at the overall picture concerning waiting lists, trolley numbers and new hospital beds or the lack thereof. I just want to quote a few of them to put them on the record. They say public hospitals in the Saolta Region Health Care Group have unmanageable waiting lists with more than 131,000 people waiting for care. Waiting lists for outpatient appointments, inpatient, day-case treatments and procedures in the region have increased by 3% since the start of the year and by 42% since 2015.

The Government's €443 million waiting list action plan has set a target to reduce by 10% waiting lists for appointments for outpatient, inpatient and day-case treatments and procedures this year. However, what has happened in the Saolta area? They have increased by 3%. This is happening because we do not have the beds and because appointments and operations are routinely cancelled. I am fed up coming in here speaking about Sligo University Hospital. We now see there is a wider picture in the whole region. Unless significant investment is put into the Saolta region both in terms of beds and employment of consultants, we will have these statements from the Irish Hospital Consultants Association and they are getting worse year on year.

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