Patients waiting 4-12 hours = 2,593
Patients waiting 12 hours + = 600
March 2011 although a better response is still totally unacceptable;
Patients waiting 4-12 hours = 2, 146
Patients waiting 12 hours + = 367
For the 2 months on average, 80 people waited four to twelve hours a day in NHSCT A&E’s with a further averge of 16 people per day waiting twelve hours or more.
Is this acceptable for our sick mothers and fathers, children, family and friends? Can anyone give any justification as to why thousands of patients are waiting in A&E’s in the NHSCT while they have the Mid Ulster Hospital laying empty.
Capacity could not meet demand before Mid Ulster was closed, how was it ever meant to demand after Mid Ulster and Whiteabbey were removed. The only people who are saying the move to shut Mid Ulster was correct and these are the same Health Chiefs who are getting paid hundreds of thousands of pounds of Tax Payers money every year.
More worryingly is the fact that these figures are not a true reflection of the actual waiting times within the NHSCT, more so in Antrim where waiting times are being manipulated by Trust Management in order to fool the public and governing institutions.
When a patient arrives at Antrim and is placed in the Clinical Decision ward, this time spent is not classed as time spent in an A&E. When a patient is placed in the short stay ward at Antrim the clock stops and is not classed as time spent in A&E, this was confirmed by the former chief exe of the NHSCT, Colm Donaghy at Magheraflet Council Buildings in 2010.
In both cases patients are not admitted to the hospital, yet they are not classed as being in A&E. They are laying in limbo, lying in public corridors, laying in their own blood and at times their own waste. In the past I have witnessed these horrific conditions first hand.
The week beginning 09/05/2011 has seen up to 90 trolley waits at Antrim, according to information received from staff, as the Trust push on plans to remove inpatient facilities from Mid Ulster.