Vale of Clwyd MS, Gareth Davies, has called for an urgent statement from the Welsh Government’s Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care following a distressing account of a patient’s final moments at Ysbyty Glan Clwyd, which were shared on social media.
During today’s Business Statement and Announcement in the Senedd, Mr Davies raised the account of a visit to Ysbyty Glan Clwyd shared by a social media user which described dangerously overcrowded conditions in A&E, with patients placed on beds and chairs lining the corridors.
The social media user reported seeing an elderly and frail woman lying alone on a corridor trolley, visibly distressed, making laboured noises, and, sadly, later passing away in the corridor. The author noted, “She had passed away alone in the corridor with no privacy and no one holding her hand.”
Mr Davies stressed that this was not a criticism of frontline NHS staff, who are working under extreme and intolerable systemic pressures, but said the incident exposes the human cost of a system that has allowed “corridor care” to become normalised.
He warned that no patient should spend their final moments in such undignified and distressing conditions and described corridor care as “cruel and inhuman”, and unworthy of a developed nation.
In response, the Trefnydd and Cabinet Secretary for Social Justice, Jane Hutt MS said, “over the last four years, £12 million in Six Goals funding has been provided to Betsi Cadwaladr to improve urgent and emergency care.” She went on to say that the Six Goals funding is about “safely managing more people in the community.”
Mr Davies has also written to the Chief Executive of Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board, Carol Shillabeer, seeking reassurance that this incident will be examined thoroughly and that decisive action will follow.
Following the exchange, Gareth Davies MS said:
“The distressing reports of a patient dying alone on a trolley in a hospital corridor is a shocking indictment of the state of emergency care in Wales, and it should haunt the Welsh Government.
“This tragic case exposes the consequences of a lack of community beds, delayed discharges, overcrowding, and a system that has allowed corridor care to become routine.
“The Welsh Government must now act immediately to end corridor care by expanding bed capacity, speeding up patient flow, increasing access to primary care, and treating this as the national emergency it so clearly is.”