First Minister Mark Drakeford has said that the state of Wales' biggest A&E department is "unacceptable". Earlier this year, an inspection of Cardiff's University Hospital of Wales emergency department found a series of failings - including inadequate seating and that the department was visibly dirty.
Healthcare Inspectorate Wales (HIW) visited the unit between June 20 and 22, with their findings released earlier this month. While the health board has accepted the findings, the First Minister has now said they are "absolutely unacceptable".
He made the comments as part of plenary on October 10, in response to a question by leader of the Welsh Conservatives Andrew RT Davies. The leader of the opposition told the Senedd that one of his constituents, an 86-year-old woman waited 20 hours to be seen by a doctor at UHW after she suffered a suspected stroke.
Read more: Patients sit on bins at Wales' overcrowded, 'visibly dirty', struggling flagship A&E unit
He said that she vowed never to visit a hospital again after the experience. Mr Davies told MSs: "Her assessment now is that she will never go back to a hospital, and all she wishes for is that she has a painless death."
Mr Drakeford responded by saying that the individual needed to take up her concerns with the clinicians responsible for her care, but that it was "clearly unacceptable" that such an experience would occur. And reacting to the report he said: "It's important to emphasise isn't it that the report found that the majority of patients being treated with dignity and respect and that they were receiving good emergency car. That's what the report says.
"But the report also says that there were numerous environmental factors in impacting on the ability of staff to provide dignified care. And let me be clear, It is absolutely unacceptable to me to read a report that says that the emergency department is dirty, that the emergency department doesn't have enough chairs for people to sit on, that an emergency department is unable to provide access to water for people who are waiting."
He added that the "huge pressure" on the health board was not an excuse for the issues at the A&E department. He continued: "Look, I understand the system is under huge pressure with unprecedented numbers of people presenting and staff who are under the most huge pressures for everything they've gone through in recent years. That does not excuse a health board for failing to deliver on those very basic environmental standards."
HIW visited the Cardiff-based emergency unit and assessment unit between June 20 and 22 and identified a series of failings. Details of the full report can be found here.
Inspectors said there was insufficient seating - which led to one patient sitting on the floor and another sitting on bins in a corridor. And within the neighbouring assessment unit, the report found that patients were so close to one another that it sometimes compromised their privacy and dignity.
Within waiting areas it was discovered that some patients spent hours on high-backed chairs which were unsuitable for resting or sleeping. Inspectors also identified one person who had spent the night using an arrangement of two high-backed chairs that did not recline.
"We saw used urine bottles left on patients' bedside tables and, on occasions, patients were not always appropriately covered with sheets or blankets to maintain their dignity," the report stated. "We saw toilets that were out of use for the duration of our inspection and one of the toilets did not have a working lock to prevent people entering. We found the environment, within the emergency unit and the assessment unit, impacted negatively on the privacy and dignity of patients."
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