19
Nov 2019
Hospital waiting times in England at worst level on record
It has been revealed that key waiting times for A&E, cancer and hospital care, have been missed for over three years, with delays for A&E and hospital care hitting their highest levels since both targets were introduced.
Demand for all services within the NHS is rising and they are still managing to see the overwhelming majority in time. However, performance has been deteriorating for a number of years and is now well below what it should be.
President of the Society of Acute Medicine, Dr Nick Scriven, said that urgent action was needed, warning that the system was “imploding”, and added “These figures are truly worrying as we haven’t even reached the ‘traditional’ winter period yet.”
However, Chris Hopson, chief executive of NHS Providers, which represents health managers, said that senior staff should be more careful when it came to the language they used, in particular criticising the use of ‘imploding’.
He did however, admit that he was worried about the “huge pressure” on the system at this point of the year before the full onset of winter.
A spokesman from NHS England conceded that hospitals were under pressure, seeing “older and sicker patients”, adding that hospitals should be opening additional bed with winter coming. He also urged the public to play their part by getting the flu jab and using the 111 phone line and NHS online services “as first port of call for non-emergencies”.
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Posted by Tony May, Partner/head of Clinical Negligence Department, Chadwick Lawrence LLP (tonymay@chadlaw.co.uk ), medical negligence lawyers and clinical negligence solicitors in Huddersfield, Leeds, Wakefield and Halifax, West Yorkshire.
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