Derry A&E staff in plea amid huge pressures

Derry Journal

Medical staff at Derry’s Emergency Department have urged people to consider alternative treatments if appropriate due to huge pressures this week with dozens of patients waiting up to three days to be admitted to a ward.

Transcript

00:00Good afternoon, my name is Christopher Sharkey, I'm one of the emergency medicine consultants

00:04working in Alton McGelvan ED. I am speaking to you today to appeal for your help in relation

00:10to what is going on in our department. Currently at half twelve on Monday the 16th of December

00:15we have 121 patients in the department. There's 63 patients waiting for admission onto one

00:21of the medical or surgical or other wards. Some of them unfortunately are waiting three

00:25days for a bed. So I'm appealing to you for your help. There are things you can do to

00:31help us out. First of all, if you do need to come to hospital we advise you to seek

00:37our help and we will treat you accordingly. There are alternative pathways that you may

00:41want to consider. For example, you could use your GP service, your local pharmacy, but

00:46again I want to emphasise to yourself that if you are well we are more than happy to

00:50see you, but we will prioritise the most unwell patients first which may result in longer

00:55waits for you. Thank you.

00:58Hi, I'm Neil Black, I'm one of the clinical medical leads in the hospital. While a lot

01:03of people who are in the emergency department for admission really need to be in admission

01:07and need inpatient care, some of those that are still here just need to go home and need

01:11support. So if you do have a relative who is in the hospital we may ask you to take

01:15them home as early as you can. Unfortunately that means that you might need to take some

01:19time off work or other things, but even that one person getting home makes a big difference

01:24to them, makes a big difference to the department. So if you do have a relative and you're asked

01:30to see if you can take them home, please offer significant amount of discretion with that

01:34and come as early as you can to help them get home.

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Transcript

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