A man who was admitted to a South Australian hospital with a bacterial ear infection has claimed he spent the night in a storage room.
His comments emerged as Premier Peter Malinauskas and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese announced the fast-tracking of a $400 million upgrade to the Flinders Medical Centre, where he was treated.
In a Facebook post earlier this month, a 61-year-old complained about his treatment and called out the premier.
“After a horrible few hours I get to sleep in the storage room. All I can do is cry,” the post said.
The man said there was a sharps bucket next to his head.
“I have mentioned Peter Malinauskas in my post but I am sure I will not hear from him or his office,” he wrote.
“Maybe if I was a racing car driver he would respond.”
The premier addressed the controversy on Thursday.
“I’m with him. That’s why we are building a lot more beds here at Flinders,” he said.
“We’re not just doing it, we’re doing it really quickly.”
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But opposition health spokesperson Ashton Hurn said there should be “no excuses” for patients staying in storage cupboards.
“(There’s) no reason from Peter Malinauskas when it comes to putting these South Australians in storage spaces,” Hurn said.
Albanese jetted into Adelaide today to help announce 26 more beds would be added to a $400 million upgrade to the medical centre.
“It’s a great hospital that looks after people in the southern suburbs of Adelaide but one that is in need of an upgrade,” Albanese said.
The administration area inside the hospital will be cleared in order for 16 new beds to come online four years ahead of schedule.
They will be ready within weeks by shifting a less acute ward to a hospital at Daw Park.
With today’s changes, the medical centre will have 162 more beds by the time the project is completed, in 2028 at the earliest.
The South Australian Salaried Medical Officers’ Association has concerns the hospital doesn’t have enough staff to accommodate the changes.
“Certainly at this stage, we haven’t got any nitty gritty or the detail that’s going to be used to help support the beds, including staffing and all those wrap arounds that are absolutely necessary for the patient care,” chief industrial officer Bernadette Mulholland said.
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