Trade Unions at Torrevieja Hospital are demanding the reopening of rooms that were closed by the management in May as a measure to save costs.
They say that the lack of facilities caused unacceptable queues in the Accident and Emergency Department over the recent weekend with, at one point, 28 patients waiting for admission.
The Unions denounced the situation which they say is a regular occurrence since the closure in May of about 40 patient rooms located in a second floor wing, next to paediatrics.
According to one source, the closure has once again caused “a collapse of such magnitude that the Emergency Room doctors were unable to provide an adequate service, because there was no physical space to locate to the patients”.
The works council considers it “incoherent” that the facility is “working to obtain a Joint Commission accreditation, which is an international recognition of quality and safety”, and yet “at the weekend” the emergency room was unable to deal with the 28 Patients”.
They say that they have “brought the severity of the current situation to the attention of the hospital management on many occasions” adding that it will be further aggravated during the summer period by the large influx of tourists.
However a spokesman for the management said that “On Sunday, as a result of the good weather, the influx of patients was greater than on the other days of the week, but it was nothing out of the ordinary. The attention that staff were able to provide was correct and perfectly acceptable. This morning at 12:30 the situation was absolutely normal, with no patients pending and everything operating as usual.”
