HSE “shooting itself in the foot” – doctor.

A LIMERICK doctor has accused the HSE of shooting itself in the foot and adding to the huge numbers left languishing in the University Hospital’s Emergency Department.

On a day when there were 47 patients waiting for beds for up to two days at the hospital, Jason McMahon, a general practitioner with Limerick’s Treaty Medical group said that GPs could be doing far more to keep people from going to the emergency department.

“If a medical card patient comes in with a cut finger, the doctor gets paid €20 by the HSE to stitch it up. The pack to do the stitching costs €20 – then there’s the time spent stitching and taking the sutures out on another visit. If a private patient comes in with health insurance, the GP could charge more, but we’re contracted to provide the same services to private and GMS patients, so now we can’t offer that kind of service to anyone”.

“We could do a lot more procedures but we don’t because we’d go out of business doing them as a result of the cuts imposed by the HSE. Then the patient is thrown back on the hospital system which is a much more expensive way of treating them. The HSE has shot itself in the foot”.

The Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation was calling this week for the implementation of the Major Emergency Plan at University Hospital Limerick (UHL) “to bring about a level of control and safety at the emergency department”.

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“This is catastrophic and the plan should have been utilised to protect the patients, the staff and to assist to make the hospital safe,” said Mary Fogarty, INMO representative for Limerick.

“Despite the fact that the Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA) detailed a range of risks resulting from the overcrowding in UHL last June, it still continues. The INMO has assessed that at least an additional 70 acute beds are required to cope with the fallout from a totally mismanaged reconfiguration process in the Mid-West.

“We are also appealing to the new Minister for Health to take urgent action in respect of the consistent and deplorable overcrowding in the Emergency Department. If €2million is made available by the Minister, an additional 30 beds can be in place in time for expected winter pressures”, Ms Fogarty added.