An A&E unit was so crammed doctors were unable to reach and resuscitate a man in a wheelchair who suffered a cardiac arrest, a nurse said. The man died as his frantic wife screamed for help in the inhumane scene at the hospital at which the nurse works. She shared the case in a harrowing testimony at the current state of her A&E, that echoes the Mirror's investigation this week which shows people being treated on trolleys in corridors has become the "new normal".
The nurse, who wants to remain anonymous, told how corridors are often full at their Greater London hospital with patients waiting for - or receiving - treatment. Mental heath patients have breakdowns, equipment is tired and patients are struggling to get oxygen in the nurse's hospital, they say.
"It was – and is – inhumane, but then I could use that word to describe a lot of what is unfolding in our emergency departments these days and in which corridor nursing, which should really only be used in exceptional circumstances, has become a daily reality without which A&E departments couldn’t function at all," the health professional says.
It comes as a top doctor warned half the population will end up in A&E every year if more care is not delivered by GPs, community clinics and social care. A&E will bear more of the flack, it is feared. And the nurse adds: "Even the corridor was filled to capacity with patients on trolleys, in wheelchairs and waiting room chairs, along with their relatives and other ‘walking wounded’ patients, all trying to navigate their way to and from the vending machine at the far end.
