IHCA: Patient care in decline
Doctors have warned of a “sharp decline” in the standard of patient care against a backdrop of a growing number of vacant consultant posts.
The Irish Hospital Consultants Association (IHCA) said a survey of its members found almost nine in 10 believe patient care is being compromised due to a lack of suitably qualified consultants. Moreover, hospitals will struggle to sustain current clinical service levels if more posts aren’t filled.
HSE figures to the end of December 2018 show 479 consultant vacancies, including 101 in psychiatry and 38 in paediatrics.
Of more than 900 consultants surveyed, three-quarters said patient waiting times had deteriorated over the past year, which they said was attributable to vacant consultant posts. The majority said this, in turn, was attributable to inequity of pay, since a two-tier pay system was introduced in 2012, resulting, in some cases, in “new entrant” doctors earning €50,000 less than colleagues doing the same job.
A third of consultants who responded to the survey said there were between one and three permanent approved consultant posts in their department currently vacant;
More than half (54%) said they were “not confident” that a vacancy would be filled with a suitably qualified candidate.
They warned the upshot for patients was longer waiting times, adding to the existing difficulties, with 542,000 awaiting their first outpatient appointment with a consultant and another 71,000 on inpatient waiting lists. IHCA president Donal O’Hanlon said the survey results were “stark and overwhelming”.
“Patient care and safety is being damaged due to Government policy,” said Dr O’Hanlon. He said the reason the health service was unable to fill consultant posts was due to “deliberate government discrimination” in paying new entrants less.
He called on the Government to restore pay parity to encourage consultants to take up posts.
“All patients need timely high-quality care and this is not possible without the required number of consultants,” said Dr O’Hanlon.
The survey includes anonymised comments from consultants on how staffing deficits are impacting patient services.
One said: “It has become a new ‘normality’ that I need to apologise to patients for increasing waiting period in clinics and for being unable to see those patients after commencing therapies.”
Another said: “Backlog for breast screening will lead to delayed cancer diagnosis and treatment.”
