More patients waited over 12 hours for a bed from A&E in November at hospitals run by Pennine Acute than anywhere else in England

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The data also shows that the number of patients waiting longer than 12 hours to be admitted (from decision to admit) has increased locally by 69% from last month

More than 300 patients waited over 12 hours for a bed at A&E departments run by Pennine Acute Trust last month – higher than anywhere else in the country.

Of the 2,141 patients across England who spent over 12 hours waiting for admission, 337 (16%) waited at Pennine Acute hospitals, including Fairfield General Hospital and The Royal Oldham Hospital.

The data, which also includes North Manchester General - now operated by the Manchester University Foundation Trust as of 1 April 2020 - shows that the number of patients waiting longer than 12 hours to be admitted (from decision to admit) has increased locally by 69% from last month.
 

Read more: More patients waited over 12 hours for a bed from A&E in October at hospitals run by Pennine Acute than anywhere else in EnglandPublished: 17 November 2020

The Royal College of Emergency Medicine, the single authoritative body for Emergency Medicine in the UK, says ‘emergency patients and staff are being let down as overcrowding in hospitals continues’.

President of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, Dr Katherine Henderson said: “These data show that hospitals are struggling and talk of hospitals being empty is nonsense. Empty hospitals do not have long ambulance queues. Empty hospitals do not have patients waiting over 12 hours for a bed.

“With a focus on the NHS like never before, this difficult year was an opportunity to put a permanent end to crowding, but these figures make clear that this opportunity has been wasted.

“We have warned endlessly about crowding; how it not only feeds the spread of Covid but is dangerous for patients in its own right. Departments were struggling before Covid and will continue to until we achieve an adequate hospital bed base – additional monies to improve Emergency department facilities were very welcome but what is needed is flow.

"Emergency patients and staff are being let down as we head into Christmas. No-one should be waiting for 12 hours, and our own internal data suggests this figure is the tip of the iceberg – the figures reported from NHS England are only measured from when a decision to admit has been made and not time of arrival.

“Staff were rightly lauded earlier during the pandemic for their hard work, but the failure to prevent another winter of crowding means that, for ED staff, these words were ultimately empty. There has been little meaningful action to solve the chronic problem of crowding.

“While the risk of Covid will eventually diminish with a new vaccine, we worry that nosocomial infection will be replaced as the number one risk to the lives of patients with crowding and corridor care returning with a vengeance.”

Responding, a spokesperson for the Northern Care Alliance NHS Group said: “Our staff are working incredibly hard at making sure A&E patients are seen as quickly as possible.

“We are working with our system partners to tackle the challenges Covid-19 brings and improve performance and would like to remind the public of the importance of doing what they can to help minimise the spread of the virus, washing their hands regularly, wearing a face covering, and socially distancing.”