A 66-year-old man who had a stroke was moved yesterday evening to a ward after spending two days on a trolley in the A&E department of the Mater hospital, Dublin.
The man suffered the stroke on Wednesday and was admitted to the A&E department at 1.45 p.m. He remained on the trolley until 4.20 p.m. yesterday, when he was taken up to the stroke unit.
His family, from East Wall, Dublin, said the conditions were inhumane and they stayed with him 24 hours a day as they were afraid to leave him in the busy A&E.
Yesterday, the man's son-in-law, Mr Paul Walsh, said every day they were promised a bed but nothing happened.
The conditions were not very humane. The man was paralysed and could not swallow so he could not eat or drink. They put him on a drip but it was only yesterday they put nutrients in it, he said.
"The neurologist saw him for the first time today and yet we were told by a junior doctor when we first came in that the first 24 hours were critical," Mr Walsh said.
The patient was in a cubicle but there were all sorts of people in the A&E coming and going. It was always busy and there were drunks at night, he said.
The family stayed with him 24 hours a day, which meant sitting with him through two nights, because they were afraid to leave him there. The man's wife and three daughters were with him all the time. The daughters had children and they had to be minded by other grandparents, he said.
Yesterday afternoon, before the family was told the patient was being moved, Mr Walsh said: "They can't leave him there, not in those conditions. If he was in a ward at least we'd know there were nurses and doctors around and we could leave him at night."
Ms Janette Byrne of Patients Together said the family was very relieved but the situation generally did not seem to be improving.
A spokesman for the Mater hospital said yesterday afternoon that there were eight people waiting for admission to wards from the A&E. This had been reduced from 17 in the morning. The hospital has previously stated that it needed at least 100 additional beds to cope with demand.