Knocked off his bike in a collission with a car, the Government Minister has spent the night in A&E.
Injured when he was knocked off his bike by a car yesterday afternoon, Government Minister Denis Naughten was kept in hospital overnight, spending the night in the A&E department.
The hospital he was treated in had issued a warning just hours before his crash that it was full to capacity.
The case is likely to generate debate around safety for cyclists on Irish roads and overcrowding in hospitals.
Naughten, who is Minister for Communications, was with his wife along a road between Roscommon town and Fuerty at the time of the crash.
He was struck by a car and is understood to have sustained back injuries in the collision.
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Ambulance personnel were called to the scene and he was subsequently taken to Portiuncula Hospital in Galway.
His injuries are not life threatening and his wife was injured. Naughten spent last night in hospital and was accommodated in the accident and emergency department.
Patients are regularly accommodated in A&E, sometimes on trolleys, when hospitals do not have enough beds on wards for those presenting for treatment at A&E are who are kept in overnight for treatment or observation.
As TD for the Galway-Roscommon constituency, Naughten is one of a number of Independent Dáil Deputies currently in a coalition government with Fine Gael.
He has campaigned in the past for the retention of a 24-hour A&E department at Portiuncula where has been treated since his collission early yesterday afternoon while cycling.
The exact cause of the crash is now being examined by the Garda.
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