Surgery postponed as beds crisis hits

Non-urgent operations have been postponed at 10 hospitals

Routine surgery at 10 hospitals in Northern Ireland has been postponed for at least a week because of a shortage of beds.

The hospitals in the eastern and northern health board areas have been dealing with the highest number of emergency admissions for more than a year.

A decision was made that non-urgent elective admissions would be cancelled for a period of a week and we would review the situation continually

Dr Anne Wilson

The hospitals reported 200 emergency admissions on Tuesday and have encountered problems coping with the large numbers needing treatment.

Dr Anne Wilson from the Emergency Admissions Control Centre in Belfast said they had taken steps to ensure all emergency cases were dealt with as quickly as possible.

"We had about 200 emergency medical admissions and that does not take into account surgical admissions or other admissions. That's high for the 10 hospitals to cope with," she said.

"If this pressure continues at this rate then the hospitals will have difficulty in clearing that pressure.

"So a decision was made that non-urgent elective admissions would be cancelled for a period of a week and we would review the situation continually."

She said during the three-month winter period every year there was a peak in admissions, but the figure experienced on 2 January was unusually high.

"It is not ideal for any patient to have their treatment delayed in any way," she said.

Dr John McLaughlin, from the Mater Hospital in Belfast, said all the hospitals in the northern and eastern board had agreed to defer non-urgent planned admissions until at least 15 January, pending a review of the situation.

'Big intake'

He said extreme conditions had played a part in the current crisis, with a rise in fractures creating additional pressures on a system already facing an influx of annual chest infections.

He said that patients waiting on trolleys for treatment was "far from satisfactory".

"We did have a problem particularly on Monday night, we had quite a big intake and we ended up with quite a lot of patients on trolleys that we could not get accommodated. But the whole system was under some pressure".

He said there had been a great deal of co-operation within the different parts of the health service.

But he added that the eastern board area needed an additional 100 medical beds.

"There clearly are not enough beds, we certainly do experience pressures right throughout the year.

"You need to have a certain amount of slack in the system to work efficiently, in other words that there will always be beds available for those who need them.

"There is a requirement for more beds. "