Letterkenny consultants say hospital is in state of crisis

Hospital consultants have written to the Minister for Health stating concern that Letterkenny University Hospital (LUH) is currently in a state of crisis, have called for an external review of services and are warning of a collapse in services without certain action. 

The letter from the eleven consultants states: "We consider that this hospital is in crisis and rapidly approaching a tipping point beyond which failed recruitment of medical and surgical specialists will lead to a failure of on-call rosters. Such a
scenario would inevitably lead to service curtailment and raise the possibility of service collapse."

The Emergency Department (ED) at LUH is one of the largest in Ireland with almost 150 patients presenting on a daily basis, around 50 of those patients are admitted.

They say the condition of the services at the Letterkenny-based hospital has been brought to the attention of both officials and management: "The condition of our services, many of which are under extreme pressure, has been repeatedly
brought to the attention of local hospital management, Saolta Group, Department of Health and various Ministers over the last number of years."

The letter also highlights the deterioration in waiting times at the hospital since 2020. 

Consultants say that ED waiting times, are the most visible sign of a hospital in distress and that only 52% of patients are seen
in the LUH ED within 6 hours of presentation with around 27% of patients currently experiencing a wait time in excess of 9 hrs.

The letter echoes concerns expressed by 78 GPs in Donegal who also wrote to the Minister outlining grave concerns for patients at the emergency department recently and has further asked that the remit of an inquiry should also include a broader range of issues that affect the delivery of emergency care. 

They recommend the review team should examine, at a minimum, the following issues at Letterkenny, sustainability of medical and surgical services, radiology services, facilities and staffing levels in the ED, hospital acute bed capacity, access to community hospital beds for step-down, Urology, Cardiology and Endocrine Services at Letterkenny, access to, and ring fencing of elective surgical beds to facilitate cancer, orthopaedic and other surgical services with restoration of operating time for surgeons at the hospital, development of a Surgical Assessment Unit and ring-fencing the Acute Medical Assessment
Unit, implementation of recommendations of RCPI Report in May 2023, specifically the recruitment, 
of additional medical registrars to provide a 2nd out-of-hours registrar on-call, immediate release of funds for a new combined Intensive Care / High dependency Unit and recruitment of medical and surgical sub-specialties for a hospital of this size, including Geriatrics, Cardiology, Urology, ENT, Ophthalmology, Neurology, Rheumatology and Dermatology. 

The to Minister Stephen Donnelly, issued on Friday, was signed by consultants Jack Collins, Jakub Hlasny, Louise Moran, Paul O’Connor, Santosh David, Toni Shaju, Robin Singaroyan, Chris Steele, Michael Sugrue, Joe Thomas and Saquib Zeeshan.

In 2022, LUH ranked sixth highest in terms of impatient numbers in Ireland. However, the hospital ranked twelfth in terms of the budget allocated to it. 

The spokesperson for Donegal Action for Cancer Care, Betty Holmes said that their organisation said fifteen years ago that key health services were being stripped from Letterkenny Hospital and that it would become the new community hospital, she said: "We have seen nothing over all those years that would convince us that there is real commitment at local, regional and national level to Letterkenny Hospital or to the sick people of Donegal."

The voluntary organisation has asked to meet with Minister Donnelly when he comes to Donegal.