The medical director at Nottingham's hospitals has said he is 'very worried' about nurse and paramedic strikes after the trust declared a critical incident. Members of the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) in the city are set to walk out for the second time in a week in a dispute over pay on Tuesday, December 20.
Workers at East Midlands Ambulance Service (EMAS) are also due to take industrial action over pay on Wednesday, where strikes will affect non-life-threatening calls only. The action will start the day after the Nottinghamshire healthcare system declared a system-wide critical incident due to pressures on services.
Dr Keith Girling, medical director at Nottingham University Hospitals (NUH) said Queen's Medical Centre and City Hospital had become "gridlocked", with 20 ambulance crews at one point waiting to hand over patients at A&E. Last Thursday, 530 nurses and healthcare assistants were absent from NUH due to the strikes, resulting in almost 1,500 procedures being postponed.
Read more: Nottingham nurses share why they are striking as historic NHS walkout takes place
Dr Girling told Nottinghamshire Live he was worried about the impacts of upcoming strike action this week. "We are concerned about the impact the strike will have tomorrow because virtually we've got a hospital full of patients that we need to move out and nurses are really key to looking after patients, getting them better and discharged from hospital," he said on Monday (December 19).
"So that will have an impact on our ability to flow patients through." The RCN, which is asking the government for a pay rise of five percent above the rate of retail price inflation, has negotiated with health bosses to ensure no life-preserving care is impacted by the walkout.
Strikes at EMAS, which are also scheduled for December 28, could mean people with non-life-threatening calls, such as people who have fallen, may not be responded to. Dr Girling added: "We're very worried about the paramedics strike on Wednesday because what we're concerned about is that patients will come to ED by default because they can't phone an ambulance.
'Please only come if you're really unwell'
"So the message is before you come to ED on Wednesday do you really need to go to ED? Is that the only place you can come to? We're making sure we have additional clinicians at the front of the hospital but please only come if you're really unwell."
On the picket line last week, nurses spoke of "suffering on the wards", with one senior nurse saying she sometimes worked for 12 hours without a break. Dr Girling said that that was "not what we want for our staff".
He said: "We want for them to come and do a job and have a really fulfilled job at work. At the moment we absolutely recognise the pressure that all our teams are under, from the amount of demand on our services and the amount of backlog we've still got.
"We know our teams are really stretched and they're doing everything they possibly can to provide the very best care." Unions say the ministers are refusing to negotiate with them, whilst the government has claimed pay rises would be too costly.
Why not sign up to one of our newsletters by clicking here to keep up with all the latest news from across Nottinghamshire.
READ NEXT:
How Nottingham's hospitals hope to get through challenging winter
Nottinghamshire patients asked to use services 'wisely' after GP suspends urgent care
Nottingham family in limbo and unable to sell home as 'corner of living room' doesn't belong to them
Nottinghamshire Christmas bin collections and new year dates
White Christmas Day predicted in Nottinghamshire as Snow forecast
