Patients walking away from Mayo A&E due to controversial tent

THE plight of people waiting in 'a tent' when attending the A&E at Mayo University Hospital has been highlighted by a local councillor.

Some people have attended the unit but have chosen to leave without treatment, Councillor Cyril Burke told a Castlebar Municipal District meeting.

And he wants to know if the HSE have a plan to deal with matters when activity at the hospital gets back to normal levels.

Councillor Burke said he is aware of people going there at 4 p.m. and having left at 2 a.m. Others have gone and left without being treated.

The previous weekend, they had to go into a 'tent' first outside. The temperatures were very low and they had to queue up in a marquee first and then go to reception and get seen.

Another issue, he continued, is that 'there is something like one nurse to 15 patients'.

Councillor Burke was clear that he was not having a go at the staff.

With no elective surgery, or a lot of outpatients, when people start going back in on a regular basis what was it going to be like, he asked.

“It is a huge concern for people. We need to know is there a plan in place to deal with things when we get back to normal levels.”

Councillor Michael Kilcoyne agreed 'there is a crisis' at the hospital.

There are, he stated, people in the community who can't get into hospital or to see a doctor or consultant, and they can't get the care or treatment they need and that was wrong.

“People are dying from other things other than Covid,” he said, “people who shouldn't be.”

At the latest HSE meeting, they said they were under-resourced and were waiting for a new A&E and a new block of accommodation, and these things needed to be prioritised.

A new Covid unit was built, he continued, and he received a letter from a patient who was wheeled over from it ‘with rain belting down on it’.

He had witness himself a patient being wheeled by a porter to the main hospital in the lashing rain.

Councillor Blackie Gavin said the A&E was promised ‘years ago’ but consultants had still not been appointed to draw up plans.

With regards the modular unit, it was scandalous that elderly people and patients at night time have no cover over them when being brought to the main hospital.

Councillor Kilcoyne said they had been informed by the HSE that they could not put a cover over the walkway.

He asked that the council write to the HSE to offer the services of a council engineer, and they would have a walkway designed for them ‘in half an hour’.

“Let’s put our resources at their disposal,” he suggested.