In May of this year, the effects of the poor condition of the nursing facilities at the nursing home Hlíð in Akureyri began to impact. Residents were to some extent moved from Hlíð to Lögmannshlíð and new people were not accepted from SAk. Kristnesspítali also had to limit space in rehabilitation and the number of operations had to be reduced due to outflow problems from SAk.

"This continues to have the effect that more people are waiting at SAk to get into a nursing home. This is about 14% of patients at Kristnesspítali and SAk's emergency wards. The standard is that this figure is no higher than 5%," says Ragnheiður.

Increased costs for SAk

Joint meetings have been held with HSN, the managers of Heilsuvernd and the Ministry to deal with the challenge, which will still result in increased costs for SAk. "Nursing rooms are much cheaper to operate than rooms in a hospital, that's a cost that SAk has to bear," says Ragnheiður.

There is no provision for additional funding for SAk due to this.