The daughter of an elderly woman has hit out at the “complete lack of dignity” her mother experienced as a patient at University Hospital Limerick.

Michelle is a nurse who works in General Practice and her mother is 81, who is in “relatively good health”, recently developed a kidney infection. 

It was the start of the family’s “nightmare experience” that has so far lasted 11 days. 

“She required an ambulance to go to UHL on Saturday 23rd of the month,” Michelle told Lunchtime Live. 

“She was admitted, seen pretty quickly but then she was put into a corridor [on a trolley].” 

Michelle said the trolleys were lined up “like cars that are parked in a parking lot” and there was very little privacy. 

“There’s men and there’s women, the lights are on 24 hours a day, it’s chaotic,” she said. 

“Each person in the evening had to have a family member with them because there just aren’t enough nurses or doctors to look after them.” 

After several hours on a trolley, Michelle’s mother became “confused” and staff discharged her, with instructions that she be taken to St John’s hospital the next day. 

“I took her home at that time of the night and we presented to St John’s the next day,” Michelle said. 

“They weren’t aware that we were coming, they had no medical notes, they didn’t know what was wrong with her. 

“They did agree to see her, they assessed her and decided she needed admission [as] she was very unwell.

“She was developing basically sepsis from the infection.”

Return to UHL

The next night, Michelle received a call that her mother was being transferred back to UHL after her heart rate had reached 170 beats a minute - a life threatening figure. 

Michelle was keen to stress she is not criticising the staff of UHL, but she returned to find the hospital in a state of chaos. 

“[My mother] was on a trolley there… but there was an elderly man who was stripping and shouting at the nurses and he passed urine on the floor,” she said. 

“The body of a deceased person was pushed by her bed - which frightened her even more.” 

When Michelle returned, her mother was back in the hospital corridor and some of the nearby patients had their genitals exposed while they were lying there. 

Trays of food were left for the patients to eat, but some struggled to eat it by themselves. 

“Ireland is allegedly a first world, wealthy country,” Michelle said. 

“I couldn't believe that this was going on in front of my eyes.” 

Michelle's mother spent four days on a trolley and is “still very unwell”. 

“She has completely cognitively declined, she’s just so distressed by the whole thing and was left in a corridor until Friday,” Michelle said. 

Solution

Michelle believes the way to provide better care for patients is to build more infrastructure to cope with the country’s ageing and growing population. 

“They should be building new hospitals all over the country with A&E departments that can deal with these sort of things,” she said. 

UHL has been contacted for comment.

You can listen back here:

Main image: University Hospital Limerick. Picture by: PA Images / Alamy Stock Photo