The industrial action by nurses is now costing the health service up to €3 million a week, head of the Health Service Executive Prof Brendan Drumm said yesterday. Eithne Donnellanand Dr Muiris Houstonreport.
He said this was the cost of covering gaps in the system arising from the work-to-rule by almost 45,000 nurses, who have been refusing to deal with non-essential phone calls or carry out clerical or IT duties for the past six weeks.
In response the HSE has decided to dock nurses' pay by 13.16 per cent from next Friday. Prof Drumm said this action was not meant to be provocative but was intended to safeguard money for patient services.
The Irish Nurses' Organisation (INO) and Psychiatric Nurses' Association (PNA), which represent the nurses involved in the industrial action, have decided to step up their action next week in response to planned pay cuts.
The escalation will involve nurses stopping work for two hours at every public hospital and mental health facility across the State next Wednesday. A ban on overtime - which could close some services - is also to be introduced some time next week.
The HSE reiterated yesterday, as it did at negotiations convened by the National Implementation Body to try to resolve the dispute some days ago, it would be prepared to reduce the nurses' working week by one hour early next year. It also said it would carry out a study to see if it was feasible to reduce hours further.
It said a consultancy would be chosen in the next few weeks to carry out this work within a six month timeframe.
Meanwhile, the nurses, who are seeking a 10.6 per cent pay rise and a 35-hour week, stopped work for three hours at four acute hospitals and nearby mental health facilities yesterday. The stoppages took place at St Vincent's hospital Dublin, Galway's University College Hospital, Cork University Hospital and Limerick Regional Hospital.
St Vincent's hospital expressed serious concern that the work-to-rule had resulted in nurses leaving written notes for doctors to attend to patients rather than contacting the doctors by phone to protect patient safety.
In a letter to INO general secretary Liam Doran on Thursday it listed 24 instances when this had happened.
On two occasions, it said, notes had been left for doctors to attend wards to pronounce patients dead, another was left in respect of a patient who had not passed urine for eight hours, another in relation to two patients who complained of chest pain, another with details of a patient who complained of headaches and sudden weakness of the right arm, another to attend to a patient who slid from a bed and was drowsy and confused, and another about a patient who was deteriorating and whose family asked to see a priest.
St Vincent's chief executive Nicholas Jermyn said patient safety was being put at risk.
INO industrial relations officer Philip McAnenly claimed the incidents never occurred. "I totally reject the content of that list . . . there is a suggestion that nurses are not making essential calls. That is not the case," he said.
He said the alleged incidents had never been raised by management at local meetings. "I'm disappointed but not surprised because communication between the management of the hospital and their staff has been deplorably poor".
Mr Jermyn said the overall issue had been raised with the INO and the union's local committee.
In a separate development, Dr Niall O'Cleirigh of the Irish College of General Practitioners said it was "proving very difficult to get patients into hospitals and other health services" since the dispute had begun.
The GP, who practises in Dublin's inner city, said he had problems getting a patient admitted to a hospice as nurses there were not answering telephones. In another incident he was unable to speak with a nurse specialist about a patient with suspected lung cancer.
"I accept that nurses have a legitimate grievance but the dispute is not helping my practice as a GP to access services for patients", he said.