Emergency care in N.Wales 'in crisis'

STARK MESSAGE BY CHAIR OF HEALTH BOARD

- By ALEC DOYLE

EMERGENCY care in North Wales is in a "crisis situation".

That was the stark admission by Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board chairman Dyfed Edwards when a report on Urgent Emergency Care in North Wales was presented to the board.

He said while having a strategy was important, BCUHB was letting people down and needed to identify short-term actions to end long ambulance handovers, corridor care, clogged emergency departments and discharge delays.

"The reality is people are waiting in ambulances for extreme lengths of time, people are waiting in emergency departments (EDs) for extreme lengths of time, which is causing harm. That should worry all of us.

"We can have the strategies and all the rest of it, but that's the reality for people out here. We've got a clogging up of the system we have to try to address somehow.

"This paper talks about potential improvements and a whole system approach but we need to do something short-term. We can't wait for that.

"The situation is too desperate. It's dire. We've got to do something in the short term.