Yesterday’s on-call at the Hippocrates general hospital in Thessaloniki was episodic. A patient arrived in the early hours of Tuesday in a comatose state at the Emergency Department of the hospital, after using narcotics. The patient was accompanied by her partner, as stated in an anonymous complaint that reached the thestival.gr.

When the patient was administered the necessary substances by the medical and nursing staff of the hospital so that she would recover, she woke up and was out of control.

“In addition to the verbal violence, two nurses were beaten. One of them he kicked in different parts of the body and another he pulled her hair. The patient then got on a stretcher and peed on those around who were trying to help her. The police came but spirits calmed down after the intervention of the medical and nursing staff,” says the anonymous complaint.

She was also called to the emergency room Police which arrived shortly after. The woman was examined by a psychiatrist on duty and requested to be transferred to the psychiatric hospital, which was on duty.

“Three nurses were involved with the patient. The patient was in a comatose state when she was presented to us. Her companion, who was also a drug user, told us that they took drugs. After the antidotes were administered to the patient, she awoke but with agitation and immediately afterwards with an aggressive mood. At the wake, a nurse was too close to her gurney and was kicked in the stomach. They tried to immobilize the patient and took her to a nearby clinic. A disturbance was created in the area and this one, apart from being aggressive towards everyone, escaped their attention so she grabbed a nurse by the hair and threw her down. Several colleagues were involved to be able to disentangle them because he could take other actions. After the efforts of many people, they managed to remove her from the nurse and keep her under restraint,” Apostolos Pliokas, Head of the Emergency Department and nurse at Hippokrateio Hospital, describes to thestival.gr.

“I think it’s a coincidence that nothing serious happened”

The two nurses who were attacked will not be prosecuted. None were seriously injured, so that their health was at risk, however something like this could have happened as Mr. Pliokas pointed out. “The hospital has already taken action with the Police, no lawsuits will be filed. Their health was not seriously damaged by the incident but it could have been. That is, the fact that nothing serious happened, I think is a coincidence. The attack was not controlled,” he added.

“These incidents are not isolated”

Mr. Apostolos Pliokas speaks of an incident that is not isolated. The situation is further aggravated by the fact that the Hippocrates hospital also receives cases from Northern Greece, which other hospitals cannot deal with. According to the Head of the Emergency Department, the hospital is involved in the eight on-calls of the month and of those, he is on call alone. Although, according to Mr. Pliokas, the administration is making honorable efforts to help the situation, the Emergency Room remains quite unsafe. “These events are not an isolated incident at our hospital. Our hospital alone is on call at least five times a month and is involved in the city’s eight monthly on-calls. Of these, five are on duty alone. So he is called upon to face the burden of the incidents in Northern Greece because the incidents that reach our hospital do not only concern the city. It is a hospital with many specialties that it accepts and that hospitals in the province cannot deal with. A neurosurgical event like for example in Florina will come to our hospital. In an overburdened emergency room that already has a traffic accident and an interruption in resuscitation, the first intubated case will also enter, with all that entails in the Emergency Department. It entails a burden. We are used to this load. Our exposure to these risks is continuous,” he emphasizes.

“Police presence for a safer environment on duty”

The workers request that the Police keep vigilance at the hospital, so that they can intervene immediately to deal with such an incident. As Vassilis Douros, Director of the Emergency Department at Hippocrates Hospital, a surgeon and member of the hospital’s Board of Directors as a representative of the doctors, notes, the hospital’s security men cannot intervene in similar incidents as they do not have the jurisdiction.

“Ambulances are not safe environments for staff. The staff will do their job which is to take care of the health and safety of our patients. This is one of the reasons that both nurses will not take legal action and have every right to take any action against anyone who harms or compromises their integrity. On the other hand, due to legal issues, the men of the hospital’s security company do not have full authority to immobilize someone who will attack the staff either verbally or with physical violence. We recently had the example of the doctor at the Papageorgiou hospital who was humiliated because he refused to write a fake license to someone who did not want to go to the election committee. Such things happen very often. Not just from people who can’t control themselves. In this particular case the woman was a drug addict. Drunks, psychiatric patients are coming. EKAV brings them to the hospital while they have to be transferred to the psychiatric hospital of Stavroupoli. We are not on call for psychiatric cases. The staff do everything they can to ensure the health and well-being of patients. Nevertheless, in such cases, 3-4 people are needed to immobilize someone and not let him do more damage to himself, which makes the work of the on-call service difficult,” says Mr. Douros.

“As a union of workers, we would like the active guarding and normal conditions of vigilance by the Police. Since the security companies, due to legal issues, do not have full jurisdiction in repression, this role must be taken over by the police, for better or worse, to make the environment of the emergency services safer and for the citizens who sometimes get indignant when they see the destruction they create other fellow citizens but also from the staff, who must be fine to do their job”, he adds.