A 91-year-old patient suffered “light and noise torture” conditions while waiting 29 hours in the emergency department of Tallaght Hospital, according to a consultant at the hospital who has publicly criticised the treatment of the man.

Dr James Gray, a consultant at Tallaght Hospital, wrote to the hospital CEO to inform them of the situation in which the elderly man was left on a trolley for 29 hours. The man’s wife was also admitted several hours later, before being admitted for treatment after a seven hour wait.

Dr Gray told Newstalk Luchtime the situation is “Deja vu unfortunately,” after public issues over elderly patients on trolleys as recently as June, when a 1-01 year old patient was left on a trolley.

Describing the ordeal the patient faced while on the trolley for 29 hours, Dr Gray said the patient in question “would have been subjected to constant light torture, constant noise torture, major sleep deprivation as a result, no dignity, no privacy.

“Obviously he would have been an infection control risk, and a fire evacuation hazard. This man exemplifies that major breaches that are going on,” he added.

“There are number of things that can be done, that doesn’t cost a penny,” Dr Gray said, with the implementation of the full capacity protocol being one potential measure to release pressure on emergency departments.

“We spread the risk across the institution, so if you have 10 wards across the hospital, all the admitted boarders are spread across the hospital,” he said. “

“It doesn’t cost a penny and it reduces the length of (patient) stay by a day,” he added.

Tallaght Hospital has responded with a statement this evening, saying a review will be conducted “into the circumstances surrounding the disclosure and characterisation of certain confidential patient information to national media in recent days.”

The hospital say that the patient in question “has expressed strong dissatisfaction with the manner in which his personal clinical circumstances have been revealed and elements of his care misrepresented in media and other public channels over the past 24 hours.

“The patient ... has expressed his appreciation for the standard of treatment received throughout all his periods of care at Tallaght Hospital,” the hospital has said.

The statement adds that the hospital “apologises that the patient in question was subject to an unacceptable delay prior to being transferred to a ward bed on Monday.”