Hospital overcrowding: 109 patients without a bed in University Hospital Limerick
Tomas Doherty
Almost 600 patients were waiting on trolleys in hospitals around the country on Thursday morning, according to the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation (INMO).
University Hospital Limerick (UHL) was the worst affected by overcrowding, with 109 people waiting for a bed. It was followed by Cork University Hospital with 46 patients waiting and University Hospital Galway with 45 patients.
Nationally, 403 patients were waiting in emergency departments, while 196 were in wards elsewhere, the INMO said.
According to the Health Service Executive's own figures, 429 people were waiting on trolleys across HSE-run hospitals on Thursday.
There were 67 patients waiting in UHL and 50 in St Vincent's University Hospital. Tallaght University Hospital had 33 patients waiting for a free bed, according to the HSE's daily urgent and emergency care report.
The HSE counts patients waiting on trolleys or extra beds placed in inappropriate spaces in hospital wards.
The INMO also includes in its figures patients placed on corridors or chairs in other parts of hospitals while waiting for admission to a bed.
The figures come after the Minister for Health said a spike in the number of patients on trolleys over the February bank holiday weekend was “cause for concern”.
Jennifer Carroll MacNeill brought a memo to Cabinet on Tuesday about urgent and emergency care in February.
She said there were two problems that caused the spike – a lack of bed capacity and what she said were trends of spikes in trolley numbers after weekends.
Ms Carroll MacNeill told RTÉ radio that she had asked HSE chief executive Bernard Gloster to do a “deeper dive” on consultant rosters and “maximising” the public consultant contract and to report back in two weeks.
She said Waterford, Mullingar and Connolly hospitals do not have a problem with patients waiting on trolleys and “take a whole-of-hospital responsibility”, but there is “far too much inconsistency among the other hospitals”.
Trolley numbers were 15 per cent higher in January compared with the same month in 2024.
