Elderly Man Forced To Spend 2 Nights in Hospital A+E On Unicycle

The Mater Hospital is investigating the circumstances under which a a 67-year old man, who arrived at the hospital suffering from a mild stroke, had to spend several days on a unicycle in the accident and emergency ward.

Ronnie Pinback said that on top of waiting for over two days in the packed ward for a bed for treatment, his brother Bobby Pinback, was tormented by having to balance precariously on the one wheeled device, of which he had no previous experience and had only seen once on a showing of Fossetts Big Circus on RTE One several Christmases ago.

"It was a nightmare", said Ronnie Pinback. "I helped Bobby onto the machine, but he was all over the place. I spent most of the night chasing him around the wards."

A spokesman for the Mater Hospital said that it was investigating the incident but said that it was bound by patient confidentiality and could not discuss individual cases.

A different, more dishevelled looking spokesman didn't seem to be entirely aware of this rule and willingly divulged lots of sensitive information.

"Regrettably both staff and management have been managing a difficult situation at the hospital's A&E department in recent months. A unicycle was all we had to hand for Mr. Pinback. A very competent doctor judged by his gait, his athleticism, his ruddy complexion, that Mr. Pinback would be able to handle a stint on the unicycle. We did not foresee him having to stay on it for two days, but he was repeatedly checked on and seemed to be doing okay on it"

The hospital said it has been working on a number of ways to ease the problem including submitting a proposal to the Health Service Executive for a 25-device emergency transit ward to be developed as part of the A&E department.

"We have no more space for beds or trolleys so we have to improvise. The 25-device ward proposal requests a space saving, and fun, environment where patients can be kept on pogo sticks, lolo balls, space hoppers, mini-scooters, flybars and rocking horses. "

After two days on the unicycle Mr. Pinback was moved to a bean bag, and then to a bed in the shape of a race car.