Northern Ireland's winter preparedness plan has been branded "too little too late" to tackle the tough season ahead in hospital Emergency Departments.
The Royal College of Emergency Medicine was responding to the series of initiatives to protect key health and social care services during another highly challenging winter period, published by the Department of Health this week.
The measures include additional funding for GP and residential care homes, phone first services for all trusts and vaccination programmes. Health officials warned that these will not eliminate winter pressures on the Health and Social Care (HSC) system but will help to alleviate their impact.
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Announcing the series of measures on Wednesday, Stormont's Health Minister Mike Nesbitt said there's no doubt that the HSC system is again facing a very difficult winter period.
But the plan has been criticised by the RCEM’s Vice President for Northern Ireland, Dr Russell McLaughlin, who said: “This plan is described as one of ‘winter preparedness’. We are in winter. And already our Emergency Departments are experiencing huge demand, which will only increase in the months to come.
“There is little in this plan that will provide our members and patients in Northern Ireland any hope that this winter will be better for A&Es than the terrible winters we have experienced over the last few years – indeed, the signs are that this could be the most difficult yet.
“The minister has recognised that this winter will be ‘another highly challenging’ period which at least acknowledges the problem, and the plan does include elements aimed at improving social care and care home provisions, which will help to keep some patients out of hospital or allow them to leave when they are well enough – we believe this to be a small step in the right direction.
“The plan states there is capacity across all trusts to make over 300 more in-patient beds available when demand increases - we are sceptical that this will be possible. We were disappointed at the lack of any meaningful actions that could improve staffing within our Emergency Departments, particularly in light of the recent RCEM workforce census that has highlighted significant workforce gaps..“
Dr Russell McLaughlin added: “Overall, this plan feels very much like too little, too late, as we once again brace ourselves for what is becoming the inevitable annual winter crisis.
“Not adequately addressing the issues which cause overcrowding in our EDs and which delay people leaving our hospital wards will once again contribute to patient harm over the coming months – harm which is ultimately preventable.
"RCEM will continue to meet with the members of the DHC and the minister to support them to develop policies that will see an end to the terrible situation the Health Service of Northern Ireland is in.“
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