Dozens of patients being cared for in corridors, and some patients forced to wait 40 hours in A&E, with more NHS hospitals declaring critical incidents.
The health service in England is currently besieged by a tide of post-Christmas demand with medics and paramedics swamped by people becoming severely ill with winter bugs.
Several hospitals and ambulances have issued appeals to the public to stay away and not call 999 unless their life is in peril, while some have warned that elective procedures are ‘under review’.
Others have banned visitors or begged family members to come pick up patients who are well enough to leave hospital to care for them at home.
Nottingham University Hospitals have begged family members of patients who are well enough to leave but stuck in hospital to come collect them to help free beds for others
In the North East, a patient at York and Scarborough Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust was forced to wait 40 hours in A&E. Pictured: York Hospital
University Hospitals Dorset NHS Foundation Trust (pictured) was among those that have declared a critical incident. The Trust said it was currently fighting a losing battle: ‘The number of admissions is exceeding the number of patients being discharged.
Fresh NHS data shows that handover delays reached at an all-time high in the week to Christmas. More than 3,000 paramedic crews spent at least one hour waiting outside of hospitals on December 19 before they could hand over their patient to emergency department medics. The figure is the highest recorded this winter
In the North East, a patient at York and Scarborough Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust was forced to wait 40 hours in A&E.
The Trust revealed the grim figure in a message circulated to staff yesterday.
This communication also said that ‘many many’ ambulances were stuck in queues outside the hospital in York due to a lack of beds to unload patients, an issue that has plagued the NHS this year.
The Trust said nurse staffing was ‘challenging’ because so many were calling in sick. NHS England data today showed that an average of 63,000 staff were off work every day in the week to Christmas.
The Trust added it was asking staff well enough to work to pick up additional shifts to get more patients discharged out of the hospital, which would enable them to take on new arrivals.
Other shocking A&E waits are being recorded in other parts of the UK this month.
In Wales a man with severe epilepsy suffered a 48-hour wait in A&E after seeking help for chest pain, and wasn’t fed for 36-hours.
The unnamed man, was taken to Grange Hospital on December 5 with the boss of the care agency responsible for him, David Williams, telling the BBC about the patient’s ordeal.
‘He was held for 36 hours in a chair and for about 12 hours in a side room whilst they tried to admit him into hospital for tests,’ he said.
He added the patient was asleep when food was offered but when he awoke, no staff were free to offer him a meal.
Aneurin Bevan University Health Board, which manages the hospital, said it was sorry the patient had experienced the long wait, adding it had experienced ‘unprecedented demand’ over the past few weeks.
And reports have emerged of an 83-year-old woman, who had suffered a suspected stroke, being was left outside the A&E department in Leicester in a makeshift tent for 18-hours.
Martin Hull, the son of the woman, who has not been named, told LeicesterLive an ambulance took his mother to Leicester Royal Infirmary at 1pm at December 28.
Some patients have been forced to spend both Christmas and Boxing Day in A&E due to extraordinary 20-hour waits to be seen, one medic has said. (image taken at The Royal London Hospital on December 21)
NHS England data today showed that an average of 63,000 staff were off work every day in the week to Christmas (red line). Around 8,000 of the absences were due to Covid (blue line)
A&E performance has worsened in November, with a third of emergency department attendees not seen within four hours (red line) — the NHS’s worst ever performance. Thousands weren’t even seen after waiting in casualty for 12 hours (yellow bars)
More than 7.2million patients in England were stuck in the backlog in October (red line)— or one in eight people. More than 400,000 have queued for at least one year (yellow bars)
Ambulances took an average of 48 minutes and eight seconds to respond to 372,326 category two calls, such as heart attacks, strokes burns and epilepsy (red bars). This is nearly three times as long as the 18 minute target but around 13 minutes speedier than one month earlier
After being left in ambulance for an hour she was then transffered to a tent erected by the hospital manned by paramedics designed to take on patients temporarily and allow emergency vehicles to get back on the road.
But Mr Hull said his mother spent a total of 18-hours in that temporary care centre, despite staff desperately trying to escalate her care.
‘The area seems staffed by paramedics, with only the occasional doctor or nurse from A&E coming to check over patients and bring them into the hospital. It just seems crazy that is has had to come to this,’ he said.
‘I don’t blame the staff at all for this, they’re just trying to deal with a bad situation, but it’s coming at the risk of our loved ones.’
Some charities, like the Sikh group Khalsa Aid, have even been seen in hospitals handing out food and drink parcels to patients suffering eight to ten hour waits in areas like London.
And comedian Rhod Gilbert’s wife Sian Harries has also revealed they had to rush to packed A&E hospital earlier this week, following his recent treatment for stage four cancer.
Ms Harries took to Twitter on Wednesday to share their visit to an ‘absolutely rammed’ A&E at an unnamed hospital earlier this week.
She said: ‘A&E absolutely rammed with people with hacking coughs, we were only ones there wearing masks. I just don’t get it.’
It comes as fresh NHS data shows that ambulance handover delays reached at an all-time high in the week to Christmas.
More than 3,000 paramedic crews spent at least one hour waiting outside of hospitals on December 19 before they could hand over their patient to emergency department medics. The figure is the highest recorded this winter.
Ambulance handovers are supposed to take place in 15 minutes.
In the week to Christmas, a total of 13,932 ambulances spent longer than an hour outside of hospitals — the second highest logged this season.
Delays can occur due to A&E units being overwhelmed by a lot of ambulances at once, as well as a lack of beds.
Not all delays see patients stuck in the back of ambulances, some are left in hospital corridors.
These hospitals are not alone, with several more as well as three ambulance services in England warning they are under worrying levels of pressure, with some even going so far as to declare ‘critical incidents’.
This is an official warning from an NHS body that patient safety is being compromised by high levels of demand, enabling them to call upon other health bodies for help.
One doctor, who has spent over two decades working in the NHS, went so far as to call the current crisis a ‘national emergency’.
The unnamed medic told The Sun that pressure on the service was ‘beyond anything we can safely look after’.
‘We’ve got patients being looked after in corridors, patients in the corridors of each ward as well,’ he said.
‘The main issue is there are delays when people need to go into a ward — you can wait up to two days for a bed.’
He said he had recently seen 36 patients being treated in one corridor.
The NHS blames ongoing pressures in part on workforce shortages, with 130,000 vacancies across its entire workforce. On top of this, staff absences are on the rise.
It is also battling a ‘twindemic’ of flu and Covid, with 3,746 patients with influenza in hospital each day, on average, last week — up seven-fold in one month. Around 8,600 Covid patients were taking up beds on December 21, up 84 per cent on last month.
Further adding to the crisis is the fact that 12,000 hospital beds were taken up by bed-blockers in the last week.
Experts say the numbers are being driven by a separate crisis in social care, leaving patients left to languish on wards for months because there is no suitable nursing home accommodation or care available for them in the community.
Other NHS hospitals that have declared a critical incident included University Hospitals Dorset NHS Foundation Trust.
The Trust said it was currently fighting a losing battle: ‘The number of admissions is exceeding the number of patients being discharged.’
Arduous A&E waits have motivated some charities, like Sikh group Khalsa aid to step up and start handing out food and refreshments to patients experiencing 8-10 hour waits
It added that while elective procedures like knee and hip operations were still being carried, this was under ‘constant review’.
Another critical incident was declared at Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust (NUH) yesterday, due to the number of people attending A&E with ‘respiratory conditions’.
Hospital bosses said they had 220 patients in their emergency department with 70 more waiting for a bed.
However, they added that the bed-blocking crisis was compounding the issue. Some 160 patients had been declared well enough to leave the hospital for 24 hours but couldn’t be discharged as there no-one in the community to take care of them.
NUH’s medical director Dr Keith Girling begged family members of patients stuck in hospital to come collect them to help free beds for others.
He said: ‘With the busy holiday period, often families aren’t ready or prepared for their loved one to come home and we are asking for their support to help our discharge teams get those patients who are medically fit back home as soon as possible.
‘There are some really simple things that can help, like collecting your relatives as soon as possible, setting up a bedroom in their home or going to their house to stock the fridge and pop the heating on.’
NHS Greater Manchester was one body that issued a plea for the public to only use emergency services in the direst of circumstances yesterday.
Writing on social media they said: ‘The first day back after the Christmas break is always busy for NHS services — today has been beyond anything we have experienced before.’
‘We’re making an urgent plea to the public in Greater Manchester to only call 999 or attend A&E if their condition is a life-threatening emergency.
Other hospitals that have declared critical incidents so far this week include Gloucestershire Royal Hospital and Surrey and Sussex Healthcare NHS Trust.
Two ambulances services, South Western Ambulance Service and North East Ambulance Service, have also warned they are in a critical incident.
The East of England Ambulance Service has also issued a Business Continuity Incident, which is a warning that services are under pressure due to demand.
Other NHS trusts have also warned they are ‘under pressure’ but are yet to declare any official kind of incident.
These include Sandwell and West Birmingham NHS Trust and Royal Devon University Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust.
And a hospital in Cornwall yesterday urged people heading to the region for New Year to bring their own medications such as pain relief and rehydration powders.
Royal Cornwall Hospitals NHS Trust, which has urged people to only call 999 or use the emergency department for life-threatening illnesses and injuries, tweeted the advice ahead of the upcoming celebrations.
It said: ‘Heading to Cornwall this New Year? Just in case, be wise and bring these three self-care kings! Pain relief, flu and cold remedy and rehydration powders. And don’t forget to pack any prescription medicines, too. Help Us Help You.’
The trust attached an image detailing what people should have in a first aid kit, including bandages, dressings, tweezers, scissors, antiseptic and medical tape.
Other NHS bodies have taken more drastic measures due to the surge in winter demands.
Two hospitals have now banned most visitors and instructed patients to wear masks on its wards after being ravaged by a swath of winter bugs and Covid.
The move was enacted jointly by NHS Northampton General Hospital and Kettering General Hospital Trusts yesterday.
However, hospital bosses say the move is needed to protect vulnerable patients on the wards from a ‘significant increase’ in Covid, flu, RSV, and norovirus infections.
But the decision prompted fury from one Tory MP who called said ‘locking’ patients away from their loved ones was ‘wrong and cruel’.
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