'Explosion' in flu cases putting strain on local doctor services

An ‘explosion’ in the number of flu-like illnesses has put a huge strain on general practices in Ireland, said Dr Padraig McGarry, president of the Irish Medical Organisation.

Rapidly growing numbers of flu cases will affect the capacity of hospitals to cope with their normal workloads of planned procedures, Dr McGarry warned.

The early arrival of the flu season deepens the hospital bed crisis which was further highlighted by the forced cancellation of vital chemotherapy sessions for children fighting cancer at Crumlin’s Children’s Hospital.

The mother of 10-year-old Alex O’Shaughnessy revealed publicly her son was among several children whose chemotherapy has been delayed several times due to a lack of hospital beds.

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The numbers of flu-like illnesses more than doubled to 37.5 cases per 100,000 population in the week ending December 8. Three people aged over 65 have died so far of flu-like illnesses.

“It was like someone pushed a button in the middle of last week and it just exploded,” said Dr McGarry, a GP working in Co Longford.

Children and young adults are among those most hit by the strains of viruses now circulating in the community.

“The kids who are presenting at the moment are children with the RSV virus. There are some with influenza. And there are a lot of other minor RSV viruses that are troublesome, not necessarily debilitating but they would add significantly to the workload in general practice,” he said.

“We also see a huge increase in attendance in out-of-hours. The good thing is there has not been high presentation of cases among the chronically ill.”

Dr McGarry added that many people in at-risk groups have been vaccinated.

People with chronic illnesses who suffer from flu-like illnesses often need hospital care and that “will place strain on an already over-strained system. Unfortunately, there just aren’t enough hospital beds,” he said.

Those patients admitted to hospitals with flu-like illnesses are going to displace other would-be patients listed for planned procedures.

“Those people on the lists are not getting procedures done and will be added to the never-ending waiting lists.

“Every year it is the same problem. They have a plan to open beds to mitigate the effect. The difficulty is trying to plan for the unknown and when is flu going to hit. Now it has hit all of a sudden,” Dr McGarry said.

He went on to speak of “a perfect storm” brewing in the health service caused by the lack of hospital beds and a lack of hospital consultants. Every year, an extra 20,000 people reach the age of 65 and this cohort will need an increased amount of hospital care. But the increase in numbers of over-65s is not being matched with the required number of new hospital beds.

Coupled with the failure to fill 500 hospital consultant posts because of pay cuts for new consultants, it has resulted in this “perfect storm” of problems in the health service, he said.

Dr McGarry said there have been some outbreaks of flu-like illnesses in some groups who have been vaccinated.

“The current vaccine contains H1N1 and H3N2 and also an influenza B but there was an outbreak of some additional influenza Bs that might not have been included in the vaccine. But you will always get that type of thing,” he said.

The Irish Hospital Consultants Association said the impact of this year’s flu “is exposing the Government’s complacency over the past nine years and its failure to investing in our public hospitals”.

“The reality is that we have an insufficient number of hospital consultants and acute beds to provide essential care to patients.

“The IHCA has repeatedly called on the Government over the past nine years to provide the necessary capacity to treat patients.

“The Government’s failure to do this has resulted in a growing and unacceptable dependence on trolleys to treat critically ill admitted patients, and record waiting lists for hospital care,” said the spokesman.

He said hospital capacity deficits and the shortage of consultants was forcing hospitals to shut down essential day-to-day services such as chemotherapy treatment and chronic pain management for children in Crumlin Children’s Hospital.

Similar service restrictions are a regular occurrence throughout all of our public hospitals, he said.

A spokesperson for health minister Simon Harris told the Sunday Independent agreement has been reached between the National Treatment Purchase Fund and the HSE to fund an extra 190 beds in a number of hospitals.

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