Some patients attend A&E hundreds of times a year

SOME patients are attending accident and emergency units hundreds of times per year because they feel they have nowhere else to go, the British Red Cross has suggested after analysing NHS data spanning six years.

The charity’s study found less than 1 per cent of the population was responsible for a sixth of A&E attendances, almost a third of ambulance journeys and a quarter of hospital admissions.

One patient was found to have attended A&E on 364 occasions in a single year and hundreds of other people had sought emergency treatment at least twice a week.

Patients said they had turned to A&E units after their GP had dismissed symptoms such as chest pains and trouble swallowing. Experts said the associated £2.5bn cost to the NHS could be vastly reduced by action to tackle the social problems of the most vulnerable.

NHS data identify 367,000 people who attend A&ES in England at least five times a year and include 16,000 people who visit at least 20 times annually and some 370 who attend at least twice a week.

All patients interviewed for the study said they had initially contacted a GP about their health problems but many were dissatisfied with their response.

The report said: “Some people we interviewed said they’d gone to A&E on occasions where they couldn’t get a GP appointment. Healthwatch England report that since the outbreak of Covid-19, 75 per cent of people … said they faced challenges with GP access, leaving them feeling negative about … access [to] primary health care.”

Several patients interviewed for the study said their GP did not listen to them, or fully understand their problem, so they went to A&E to seek a second opinion or reassurance.

Julia Munro, British Red Cross lead on high intensity use services, said: “When someone is repeatedly coming to A&E, it often indicates they are facing wider problems. We work with people who face all kinds of challenges, from poor housing to grief to childhood trauma, or who are struggling to cope with ongoing health issues.

“Getting the right help for people reduces ambulance and A&E use and hospital bed days [and] brings positive change to people’s lives.”