Recurring backlogs at the Accident and Emergency department (A&E) of the Queen Elizabeth Hospital (QEH) are impacting the ability of the Emergency Ambulance Service’s to meet the needs of the public.
Head of the Emergency Ambulance Service Dr David Byer explained that the shortage of beds at the hospital often meant that patients must remain on the ambulance stretchers for longer periods when brought to the A&E.
Additionally, Byer revealed that over the Christmas season there was a 25 per cent increase in demands for the service.
Byer made the comment to the media after the unveiling of a new addition to the ambulance fleet, bringing the total to ten.
“The issues at the QEH have impacted markedly in terms of responding to calls.
“We normally go for the patient and put them on a stretcher, but sometimes when we do get to the hospital there is no capability to transfer the patient from the ambulance to an A&E stretcher because of the number of patients there and we have to leave the trolley with the patient.
“We have invested in surplus stretchers but sometimes even those are used up. So, there are times that we have ambulances and personnel but no trollies and that impacts our response time,” Byer said.
He further explained there was no simple solution to the problem as acquiring more stretchers would pose a challenge as it related to storage.
“If we buy more trollies, it comes down to space. Where are we going to put them? The A&E is a fixed space and usually when they have all the stretchers there, they are parked in the corridor. So, if we were to buy more stretchers it would be a situation where there would be no more space in the A&E plant to move the patients in,” he added.
He pointed out that in addition to the backlog at the A&E, a case is also being made for more staffing to ensure that an adequate complement of ambulances is available for each shift.
Byer also pointed out that some roads also presented a challenge, as it was not easy for motorists to pull to the side in order for ambulances to pass.
“Even though we have a fleet of ten, we can put about five on the road because of staffing numbers. We had about 1 500 calls during the Christmas season and that is an anomaly because the number is usually around 1 200 calls.
“In the holiday season, we had more traumatic incidents, vehicular accidents and interpersonal violence. We also had more people who fell ill because of non-communicable diseases. You find people may have a crisis because they did not take medication or over-indulged,” he explained.
However, director of medical services at the QEH Anthony Harris said steps were taken to clear up the bottleneck at the A&E department.
“With some planning and organisation we have been able to decrease the number of patients in the hospital. We affected a considerable number of discharges and thus move those patients from Accident and Emergency into the wards.
“We have also been able to move a substantial number of elderly patients into the Geriatric Hospital and this has also helped us with our bed numbers,” Harris said.
He added: “Elderly care still remains a challenge, that accounted for ten of the 42 beds, so we are continuing to work on this problem. We believe that we can get some measure of control of the situation.”
