Rise in elderly stuck in hospital

♦ The number of elderly people forced to spend Christmas in hospital for want of care at home has doubled in six years, new figures show.

Charities said a growing crisis in social care meant thousands of the most vulnerable people were forced to spend the festive season in a hospital bed.

The figures show 3,929 patients had to stay in hospital over the Christmas period last year, although they were medically fit for discharge – an increase from 1,995 such cases in 2010.

Experts said they fear the situation will be even worse next week, with hospitals already at 95 per cent capacity amid a shortage of home helps and care home places.

Caroline Abrahams, charity director at Age UK, said the figures showed “disastrous” failings in the social care system, which were stripping the elderly of independence and health.

“Increasing numbers are being marooned in their hospital beds, losing muscle tone and risking infection when they are medically fit enough to leave, often because of acute shortages of social care, especially of the home visiting kind,” she said. “There is no doubt that some older people’s chances of a good recovery this Christmas are being totally undermined as a result.”

The figures, revealed by Labour, come from a “patient snapshot” which captures the numbers stuck in hospital without medical need on the last Thursday of each month.

This increased from 1,995 people on Dec 30 2010 to 3,929 on Dec 29 2016. The last time the snapshot fell directly on Christmas was 2015 when 3,155 spent Christmas Eve in hospital.