.
FIVE hospitals in Ireland, including University Hospital Kerry, have had their worst-ever September for overcrowding this month, new figures from the INMO show.
Cork University Hospital, Mercy University Hospital (Cork), University Hospital Kerry, Letterkenny University Hospital, and Portiuncula Hospital have all seen more patients on trolleys this September than any other year.
There were 422 people waiting on trolleys in UHK during September, up from 268 in the same month last year, 283 in 2019, 282 in 2018 and 114 in 2017.
Continued below…
.
Overcrowding figures reached record lows nationally in 2019 and 2020 due to the pandemic response, but the INMO is warning that many hospitals are “rapidly returning to the bad old days of overcrowding”.
Overall, it is the second-worst-ever September for overcrowding in Ireland, with 8,414 on trolleys in September 2021. The worst-ever September was in 2019, with 10,641 on trolleys.
