Nurses' union directive 'compromises care'

The nurses' union's directive to keep beds in surgical wards free for emergency cases discriminates against patients admitted from other hospital sections, according to the health authorities.

"For the union, managing the hospital seems to mean favouring emergency admissions from casualty, at the expense of patients requiring acute admission for other reasons or patients needing surgery who were already given an operation date," a Health Parliamentary Secretariat spokesman said.

On Thursday, the union ordered nurses to leave two beds empty in each of Mater Dei Hospital's six surgical wards after 2 p.m., the time when consultants and doctors head home and casualty becomes busier. The directive, which continued yesterday, was given in protest at the "complete lack of planning" by the hospital's management who did not ensure there were enough beds for scheduled surgeries, the president of the Malta Union of Midwives and Nurses, Paul Pace said.

He said such bed mismanagement took up space needed for emergencies that could crop up. The union was insisting on a management policy to address the matter.

Reacting to the directive, the secretariat's spokesman said it was discriminatory. "It is wise to acknowledge that a patient waiting for a scheduled operation may also be waiting to be diagnosed with a pathology. These waits may be equally serious and may also result in an emergency if postponed.

"The guarantee that patients receive acute care, whether this is because of an emergency situation or because they require a surgical intervention, which was planned beforehand, should not be compromised," the spokesman said.

He said Mater Dei catered for about 100 emergency admissions every day through casualty and other clinical departments. Some 100 operations were carried out every day, 90 of which were scheduled. Over 300 patients are examined and treated in the emergency department every day and 25 per cent of these require hospitalisation.

While it was true that sometimes patients waited for hours in casualty, the spokesman said, "the reason for this wait is that, at times of peak emergency admissions, one has to wait for beds to be available through discharges of patients".