Clare Fianna Fáil TD, Cathal Crowe has told the Dáil that recent instances of long wait times for ambulance arrivals in Clare are unforgivable and has called for urgent action to bolster the county’s ambulance cover.
Deputy Crowe made the comments in the Dáil on Wednesday where he highlighted two examples of long wait times for ambulatory care in Clare in the past week.
Deputy Crowe said: “In instances where an ambulance is required following an accident or an incident in the home place, the arrival of an ambulance, how quickly it arrives, and how quickly it brings you to the Accident & Emergency Department is absolutely crucial.
“In Clare in the past week, there have been two notable incidents of women who faced unacceptable delays for the arrival of an ambulance. In one case, an elderly woman was three hours awaiting an ambulance following a road traffic collision near Doonbeg. She was three hours on the roadside, was sick and it was unknown what her medical status was or how critical her level of care need was. I think the delay is unforgivable.
“The following day, again in West Clare, an elderly woman was found unresponsive, with low blood pressure and with a history of cardiac issues and diabetes. Her daughter, a nurse, identified the seriousness of the situation, rang for an ambulance and was told it was on its way. 90 minutes later the ambulance still had not arrived and so her daughter decided to drive her mother to the hospital herself, all-the-while as her mother remained unwell. She should have had access to ambulatory care for that long journey to the hospital.
“I’m not blaming the National Ambulance Service, who do exceptional work in difficult circumstances but who have been run ragged in Clare. The response times in these two cases speaks to under capacity in Clare.
I have spoken many times in the Dáil, and as a member of the Health Committee, about the crisis of emergency health care in the MidWest. But, for a lot of people, the first entry point to emergency care is the arrival of an ambulance. If you live in the extremities of Clare, such as in West or North Clare, you are a long, long way from acute care and these two circumstances highlight this.
“Thankfully, both women eventually got the treatment they needed and are recovering but this will not always be the case if these response times are repeated.
“Some of those living in Clare are 1 hour and 40 minutes from University Hospital Limerick. When you consider the “golden hour”, where treatment within the first 60 minutes of a cardiac episode is crucial in terms of protecting the heart and salvaging whatever you can and keeping someone alive, this timeline does not exist geographically for those people and so they depend highly on the National Ambulance Service.
“There is only one thing that will fix this and that’s to give Clare an extra ambulance base. I understand there’s plans for one in Kilrush and I have written to the Minister for Health seeking updates on this much needed base.
“This also underpins the need for a new hospital with 24 access to emergency care in Clare. We need to do something substantial here to address the shortcomings of health care.
“Wonderful things happen in our hospitals each day but for people who live in peripheral areas of North and West Clare, they need better ambulatory care. Moreover, they need better access to acute hospital care and I hope the pending HIQA report into the need for an additional A&E in the MidWest region will come to the glaringly obvious finding that there is a strong need for one, and that this hospital will be built in Clare.
