PLX Academy · News · 10 May 2022
A new survey conducted in Ireland shows that more than 70% of A&E patients have to wait longer than the HSE’s target time of six hours to be admitted to hospital and 4% have to wait 48 hours or more. Anyone who has ever visited a hospital, knows that a long wait in front of the doctor ‘s office can be frustrating and anxiety-inducing, but can also affect overall Patient Experience.
Among the other areas cited by patients as “needing improvement” were emotional support, having sufficient time to discuss care and treatment options with a doctor, information on how to manage a condition after leaving hospital, and the opportunity for family members and friends to talk to a doctor. These are results from the survey from the Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA) and HSE’s 2021 Inpatient Survey, 10,743 patients were asked about their experiences of treatment in 40 hospitals around the country in the last year.
Patients at smaller and more specialist hospitals tended to report more positive experiences compared with medium and large hospitals.
HIQA CEO, Angela Fitzgerald, said the report’s findings underlined “how important it is to patients, and their family members, to have opportunities to talk to healthcare staff, to ask questions and to share their worries.” She said HIQA would be focusing on these areas in 2022.