Start-up that vows to solve bed blocking given £6m L&G injection

LEGAL & General has pumped millions of pounds into a Scottish health start-up that promises to tackle the NHS’S bed-blocking crisis.

Edinburgh-based Care Sourcer, which matches older people with care providers, has secured £8.5m in funding from L&G and Accelerated Digital Ventures (ADV). It will use the capital to expand across the UK, in an attempt to relieve overwhelmed hospitals. Data released last year by the Royal College of Physicians and the Royal College of Nursing showed that so-called bedblocking, where patients end up stuck in hospital beds due to problems arranging care elsewhere, had risen 40pc in a year.

The funding round comes months after the two-year-old business secured a major contract with the NHS, just before it endured its worst winter on record. Andrew Mcginley, Care Sourcer chief executive, said: “Too many people are waiting weeks or months for care. This causes incredible stress for people and their families and it’s also a huge expense to our health system. People deserve better than this broken status quo.”

Legal & General, which has backed care home companies in the past, led the funding round by investing £6m into the business. The remaining £2.5m was invested by ADV. Mike Dimelow, head of investment at ADV, said that the FTSE 100 insurer’s backing “brings into sharp focus the importance of thinking about life post retirement for older adults”.

Jeremy Hunt, Health Secretary at the time, said in February that pressures on the NHS were “probably the worst ever” but that the service was coping well under “very, very tough” circumstances.