'Antrim Area Hospital is not fit for purpose'

Already hundreds of patients every month are being forced to wait more than 12 hours for treatment at the under pressure unit - a situation the Health Minister has described as "not acceptable". And while the Trust's head of Emergency Medicine believes the recent "reprofiling of services" at Whiteabbey and Mid-Ulster will improve levels of service at Antrim by centralising resources, public representatives are concerned that the unit will simply be unable to cope.

An Ulster Unionist delegation of MLAs comprising Roy Beggs Jnr, Ken Robinson and Danny Kinahan met with Colm Donaghy, the Chief Executive of the Northern Health Trust, last week.

Describing the meeting as a useful and frank exchange of views, Mr Beggs said: "I expressed the widely held view of my East Antrim constituents that Antrim Area Hospital is currently not fit for purpose, and that it is ill-equipped to cope with the extra workload caused by the closure of the Accident and Emergency departments at both Whiteabbey and Mid-Ulster."

In response, the Chief Executive expressed his confidence that with extra full-time A&E Consultants being redeployed the service will improve and Antrim will cope.

"Initial media reports of long waits at Antrim are very worrying. I would encourage people to report to their elected representative their experiences at Antrim A&E," Mr Beggs added.

South Antrim MP William McCrea, who also met with Mr Donaghy last week, believes that the closure of the A&E units at Whiteabbey and Mid-Ulster "could bring intolerable additional pressures to the hard pressed staff at Antrim Area Hospital."

Accusing the Trust of "putting a plaster over a gaping wound", the DUP man described the move as "totally unacceptable" and warned that it could "cost innocent lives."

Meanwhile, South Antrim MLA David Ford is to seek a meeting with the head of the Patient and Client Council to discuss the resourcing of Antrim Area Hospital.

"I want to discuss the resources needed for Antrim Area Hospital given this change. I am also concerned about maternity and psychiatry services and intend to raise these matters at the meeting.

"For years, representatives from the Northern Board and local Trust have told me that the northern area is underfunded in the areas of health and social services. It is vitally important that people here get the same high standard of services as everyone else in Northern Ireland," the Alliance leader said.