{"id":448399,"date":"2026-05-14T12:15:14","date_gmt":"2026-05-14T12:15:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/448399\/"},"modified":"2026-05-14T12:15:14","modified_gmt":"2026-05-14T12:15:14","slug":"wexford-general-hospital-under-pressure-once-again-as-patients-left-waiting-for-up-to-16-hours-at-emergency-department","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/448399\/","title":{"rendered":"Wexford General Hospital under pressure once again as patients left waiting for up to 16 hours at Emergency Department"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Wexford General Hospital\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/40da1ccd-ab6e-4a3c-87f0-29715c46e1ff.jpg\" loading=\"eager\" width=\"100%\" data-testid=\"article-image\"  \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_caption1 indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_secondary indo-66f0fec7_regular indo-1d70522a_marginbottom0 indo-1d70522a_marginleft0 indo-1d70522a_marginright0 indo-1d70522a_margintop3 indo-b48c4984_left\" style=\"color:var(--color-grey-60)\">Wexford General Hospital<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom0 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">Patients presenting at Wexford General Hospital\u2019s Emergency Department (ED) have reportedly been left to wait for periods of up to 16 hours as hospital staff struggle to cope with a spike in presentations there.<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom5 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">Hospital management have issued a statement warning that the hospital is \u201cextremely busy, with high numbers of people attending the emergency department, some of whom will need to be admitted to hospital for ongoing treatment\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom5 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">However, the hospital is reportedly at full capacity as staff struggle to manage patient flow and create space for further admissions; management stating that \u201call beds in the hospital are in use\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom5 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">The hospital is currently advising that patients attending the ED for routine and non-urgent treatment \u201cwill experience longer waiting times\u201d and the public is being urged to use alternative healthcare services for treatment, such as GPs, GP out of hours or pharmacists.<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom5 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">However, they stressed that if patients are very sick and in an emergency situation, they should still present at the ED.<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom5 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">Warnings like this have become a reasonably regular occurrence at Wexford General Hospital at peak times. When issued with the request to explore alternative treatment paths, members of the public consistently express frustration at how difficult it is to secure a GP appointment in Wexford.<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom5 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">This latest busy spell at the hospital has once again brought further frustrations to light, with members of the public describing \u201coverwhelmed nurses\u201d, 16 hour waits, elderly people with large open wounds left to wait hours and hours on end before being stitched up and sent home.<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom5 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">\u201cThe HSE acknowledges that these delays are difficult for patients and apologises for the inconvenience delays may cause and that patients may have to wait for care during these very busy periods,\u201d a statement from hospital management read. <\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom5 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">&#8220;The ED is always available to treat seriously ill patients, and the sickest patients are seen first.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom5 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">The HSE has also advised that community pharmacists can provide expert advice and over-the-counter treatments for a wide range of minor illnesses and that a new service is also available which allows pharmacists to supply prescription-only medication without the patient needing to see a GP.<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom5 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">The situation at Wexford General came about as ambulance workers took to the picket line on Tuesday for the first in a series of scheduled industrial actions relating to increased pay for increased responsibility.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Wexford General Hospital Patients presenting at Wexford General Hospital\u2019s Emergency Department (ED) have reportedly been left to wait&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":448400,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[103,397,396,61,60,10489],"class_list":["post-448399","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-healthcare","tag-health","tag-health-care","tag-healthcare","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-padraig-byrne"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/448399","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=448399"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/448399\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/448400"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=448399"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=448399"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=448399"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}