Huge rise in people admitted to George Eliot

19,000 treated for major illnesses in the last month at the hospital

UNPRECEDENTED demand for care has led to Nuneaton’s hospital being ranked the fourth busiest in the whole of the West Midlands for admissions.

People being admitted to hospital is up across the region by 5.8 per cent but, at the George Eliot, this number is almost double - 9.4 per cent.

Staggeringly, the hospital is on course to treat a huge 92,000 people by the end of 2019/20 - 12,000 more than just two years ago.

And soberingly, almost as many people were seen for major illnesses last month as they were in the whole of the last financial year.

The hospital treated 20,000 people for major illnesses in the last financial year, compared to 19,000 last month.

As well as this, child admissions have also seen a big jump.

There have been 12,000 so far this financial year, with 15,000 recorded for the whole of 2018/19.

Add to this a rise in flu, and Glen Burley, the hospital’s chief executive, admits it is a challenging time at the Eliot.

He paid tribute to the hardworking staff who have had to and continue to cope with the surge of demand.

This was echoed by Russell Hardy, the Eliot’s chairman, who poignantly served a reminder to people to only use A&E in real emergencies.

“We operate an accident and emergency service, it is for accidents and emergencies and I would encourage all members of the public, while it must be frustrating to wait a long period of time to have a GP appointment, the accident and emergency department is not the appropriate route to access your healthcare,” Mr Hardy continued.

“The average visit to A&E is £200, the cost to a GP is £50 - every time they come to A&E, they are costing the system roughly £150 - the fact that it is free at the point of delivery means people are getting into the habit of coming into the AE rather than their GP.

“People are coming to the A&E too much. I am worried at the moment, I see a large increase in A&E volume, that people are circumventing primary care.”

Stephen Collman, director of operations at the Eliot, added: “The danger is that the default is that A&E is open 24/7 and people naturally present there - there is a massive increase in demand.”

Glen Burley concluded: “I would encourage members of the public to try and get a GP appointment, because there is more capacity out there than there was last year, sometimes there is this perception that they aren’t going to be able to get an appointment. GPs should be the first point of contact.”

Bosses hope pressure on the department will ease when a re-designed and expanded ambulatory care unit is opened by the end of the week.

Mr Russell asked Mr Collman: “Can you give assurance that our plans are in a good place and a better place than last year?”

Mr Collman replied: “They are the right things to do, it is just the numbers coming through the doors.”