Tallaght Hospital in Dublin is to carry out an internal review after the details of a 91-year-old Parkinson's patient, who was left waiting on a trolley for 29 hours earlier this week, were disclosed to the media.

In a statement by the hospital, it pointed out that the patient had expressed ‘strong dissatisfaction with the manner in which his personal clinical circumstances' had been revealed.

It also said that elements of his care had been ‘misrepresented' in the media. 

The hospital released the statement after details of a letter by an emergency consultant, Dr James Gray, to its chief executive were made public. In the letter. Dr Gray said that the conditions, which saw the 91-year-old patient left on a trolley for 29 hours, amounted to ‘torture'.

The patient's wife was also left waiting on a trolley for several hours.

He said that the man and other patients had no privacy, no dignity and were subjected to ‘constant noise torture, constant light torture, resulting in major sleep deprivation' and pain.

This situation also poses a major infection control hazard, he insisted.

Speaking on RTÉ News, Dr Gray said that staffing at the hospital 'is at crisis level, not just on the nursing side, but also on the medical side'.

"We can't recruit because the conditions are so poor and it's a vicious circle. So not only do the beds need to come on stream, the staff need to come on stream as well and I don't see this happening any time soon," he commented.

Speaking in the Dail on Wednesday about the issue, the Taoiseach, Enda Kenny, said he wanted to know who was responsible in the hospital for leaving the elderly patient on a trolley for so long.

He insisted that more beds have been made available, more staff have been hired and there has been a reduction in delayed discharges. However, the Irish Medical Organisation said that the Taoiseach is looking at this as a crisis in one department when it is actually a ‘system-wide problem that requires a system-wide response'.