The HSE announced on Monday that the opening of a newly constructed 96-bed block at University Hospital Limerick (UHL) is \u201cimminent\u201d, as near-record patient overcrowding continues to plague the hospital.<\/p>\n
There were 147 patients without a bed at UHL on Monday, including 54 patients on trolleys in the hospital\u2019s Emergency Department and 93 on trolleys on wards, according to official figures published by the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation (INMO).<\/p>\n
A record 150 patients were recorded on trolleys at the hospital on February 7th, 2024.<\/p>\n
Just yards from the overcrowded Limerick ED lies the first of three proposed 96-single-bed hospital blocks, which is expected to be opened in the coming days.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe look forward to the imminent opening of the first 96-bed block at UHL,\u201d HSE Mid West confirmed today.<\/p>\n
The ED and wards at UHL are consistently the most overcrowded in the country, with demand from a catchment of over 400,000 that includes all of Limerick and Clare, north Tipperary, and parts of North Cork and north Kerry.<\/p>\n
In 2009, 24-hour Accident and Emergency (A&E) departments at Clare General Hospital, Limerick Regional Hospital, St John\u2019s Hospital and Nenagh Hospital were reconfigured to the Limerick Regional Hospital, later renamed University Hospital Limerick.<\/p>\n
In 2017, a new ED was opened at UHL; however, it has not been able to cope with demand.<\/p>\n
An inquest, held last year, into the death of UHL patient Aoife Johnston, in 2022, heard from doctors that the \u201cgargantuanly overcrowded\u201d ED was \u201clike a death trap\u201d on the weekend Aoife (16) presented there with queried sepsis amidst chronic patient overcrowding and understaffing.<\/p>\n
Ms Johnston waited over 13 hours for life-saving medication that should have been administered to her within ten to fifteen minutes of her presenting at the hospital.<\/p>\n
In a statement on Monday afternoon, responding to the current overcrowding at UHL, HSE Mid West said: \u201cWe apologise to all patients who are currently facing long waiting times for an inpatient bed.\u201d<\/p>\n
It said UHL was \u201cexperiencing record demand through the Emergency Department, with an increase of 11 per cent in attendances so far this year\u201d.<\/p>\n
This increase, it added, \u201cis the highest increase in demand of any hospital in the country and compares to a national average increase of 4 per cent\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cUHL has also had the highest ED admissions in the country this year – at 21,195 – which is 5 per cent greater than at the same point in 2024. Average daily ED attendance at UHL in 2025 has been 262, and daily presentations have exceeded 300 on 25 days.\u201d<\/p>\n
To try to mitigate pressure on UHL, HSE Mid West said it had \u201cenhanced and expanded access to urgent care facilities as alternatives to the ED pathway\u201d.<\/p>\n
However, it is also clear that pressure is mounting on alternatives to the ED, as local injury units and GP-referral medical assessment units, at Nenagh Hospital, and St John\u2019s Hospital, Limerick \u201care now managing approximately 1,300 patients per week\u201d.<\/p>\n
The HSE Mid West said it recently \u201clost access to 50 sub-acute\/rehabilitation beds in the region\u201d due to a new Community Nursing Unit, located in Nenagh, having to go through a \u201cre-registration process with HIQA\u201d. It added that the 50-bed long-term residential unit should commence before the end of this year.<\/p>\n
Further patient-overcrowding mitigation measures included the opening of two new rapid-build 16-bed wards at UHL, with planning permission sought for a third 16-bed unit.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo further improve access at UHL, additional consultants are rostered at weekends and bank holidays, and we are sincerely grateful to our healthcare teams for their tireless efforts to meet our current capacity challenges,\u201d it added.<\/p>\n
Today, Limerick Sinn F\u00e9in TD, Maurice Quinlivan, said that an additional hospital, including a second 24-hour emergency department, was required for the region.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe UHL (University Hospital Limerick) group themselves have confirmed that at least an additional 400 beds are needed at UHL,\u201d said Deputy Quinlivan.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey have advised that 400 beds are the minimum and would not take account of any population growth in the mid west.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThere simply isn\u2019t the space at UHL for this volume of additional beds. These must be provided at a different location and at a new model three hospital.\u201d<\/p>\n
Deputy Quinlivan, along with his party colleague in Clare, Deputy Donna McGettigan, called for a Model 3 hospital to be constructed in Co Clare to take pressure off of UHL.<\/p>\n
Deputy Quinlivan described the reconfiguration of emergency units to UHL as ” catastrophic ” and said it regularly has to suspend or cancel elective procedures.<\/p>\n
\u201cWith the onset of winter, I fear we are in for a very difficult and probably impossible winter at the hospital,\u201d he warned.<\/p>\n
Deputy McGettigan said: \u201cThe need for an additional hospital in the Mid-West region is obvious, it is my view that an additional hospital is needed and that such a hospital should be based in County Clare.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The HSE announced on Monday that the opening of a newly constructed 96-bed block at University Hospital Limerick…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":50843,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[103,397,396,61,60],"class_list":{"0":"post-50842","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-healthcare","8":"tag-health","9":"tag-health-care","10":"tag-healthcare","11":"tag-ie","12":"tag-ireland"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50842","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=50842"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50842\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/50843"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50842"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50842"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50842"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}