IF COVID-19 admissions to hospitals in the Western Trust continue to rise as projected, it may lead to the cancellation of cancer surgeries.

The Western Health and Social Care Trust (WHSCT) Director of Acute Services, Geraldine McKay, said that while they continue to provide cancer, red flag and time-critical procedures, these are being reviewed on a daily basis, given the extreme pressures on sites.

Currently, there are six critical care beds in the South West Acute Hospital (SWAH), while Altnagelvin has 13.

However, if that was to increase to 16, a decision will have to be made about cancer services; 16 critical care beds, as well as a full capacity of critical care beds in the SWAH, would also see patients begin to be transferred to the Nightingale Hospital in Belfast.

With more and more numbers of Covid patients coming into the hospitals, capacity will be monitored as well as the staff available to run cancer sessions.

‘Tipping point’

Mrs. McKay continued: “Where the tipping point will come, for me, is when our critical care services are at extreme pressure across both sites, and we also have to redeploy staff to the Nightingale in Belfast.

“Those staff that we need to transfer into our critical care units here are our theatre staff, because they obviously are very familiar with the theatres, etc, and all of that, so they have been trained up and are ready for this.

“That would be the point in time when we would have to make a decision about cancer services, and whether or not we continue.

“I can’t give you any more detail than that, but that would be the point where we would have to seriously think about standing down cancer services – but I would absolutely say that we will continue to [maintain such services] for as long as we can, given the availability of a bed, and the staff to look after and care for the patients,” added Mrs. McKay.

Despite the ever growing numbers of positive Covid patients being admitted to hospitals across the Trust, Mrs. McKay stressed that the Trust is not prioritising Covid patients, saying that staff are continuing to ensure that non-Covid patients, and those with other life-threatening conditions, are treated as timely as anyone else.