Elderly people were left waiting for an average of 10 hours at Irish emergency departments in the first seven months of this year.

According to Freedom of Information figures released to Newstalk, the average waiting time for people over the age of 75 was nine-and-a-half hours.

The figures show that nearly 12,000 elderly people were left waiting longer than 24 hours for care.

The figures record the length of times patients were left waiting in emergency departments before being admitted to hospital or discharged.

The average waiting time for all age groups between January and July was nearly seven-and-a-half hours.

The longest average was nearly 12 hours at Mercy University Hospital in Cork, followed by over 11 hours at Tallaght University Hospital in Dublin.

More than 35,000 patients were left waiting longer than 24 hours to be admitted or discharged.

Hospital beds

Donegal GP Ciarán Ó Fearraigh told Newstalk he is not surprised by the figures.

“The problem isn’t with the emergency departments themselves per se, but the fact they’re trying to feed into beds in the hospital that just aren’t there for patients,” he said.

“And the lack of access to other urgent and semi-urgent services for patients such as outpatient department clinics, investigations and scans.”

Dr Ó Fearraigh said some patients are choosing not to go to emergency departments at all for fear of long waiting times.

“Anybody working in hospitals or in healthcare will know there are long waiting times in emergency departments,” he said.

“As GPs, we hear this from patients all the time and a reluctance from patients to attend.”

Elderly

The longest average waiting time for over-75s was over 16 hours at Mercy University Hospital.

The next worst was Cork University Hospital, at nearly 14 hours.

The HSE said it regrets that patients may experience long waiting times in emergency departments, but the sickest and most urgent cases are prioritised.