Nearly 500 people had no hospital bed in Kildare last month

A total of 499 people were admitted to Naas General Hospital in January without a bed being immediately available.

That’s according to the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation and the figure is the highest since 2018 when 516 patients had no bed on arrival through the accident and emergency department.

The 2018 January figure is the highest at the Naas facility since nurses began recording hospital overcrowding figures.

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The January before last, 2024, saw 185 without a bed while the number for 2023 was 439.

The most overcrowded centre was University Hospital Limerick where 2,234 patients had no bed followed by Cork University Hospital (1,573), Galway University Hospital (1,388), Sligo University Hospital (852) and St Vincent’s University Hospital, Dublin, (807).

The INMO said over 13,972 people have been treated in hospitals without a bed in January making it the highest month ever recorded for trolley figures.  

The organisation noted it issued several warnings during the month “regarding the consistently high level of overcrowding and the risks associated with flu surges and extreme weather.”

INMO general secretary Phil Ní Sheaghdha said : “It is clear that the HSE has not done everything that they possibly can and that their ‘winter plan’ is failing.”

She called on the HSE to outline exactly how much private capacity it has acquired from the private sector and to confirm that senior decision-makers are on site in each hospital this weekend.  

“Only a few short weeks into this year our members are telling us they are exhausted and demoralised. Seeing yet another staggering record broken tells our members the situation is being permitted to get even worse for them and for their patients.  

“Nurses and midwives have voted in favour of industrial action because they know that the current recruitment obstacles and the attitude to staffing that’s behind it absolutely need to change under the new government.”  

She added there has been a dangerous and disappointing start to 2025 for nurses, midwives and patients alike and the new government must be “laser focused on safe staffing, increasing bed capacity and fulfilling its basic duties for a viable health service and safe workplaces, before this situation is allowed to get even worse.”