A&E waiting times performance hit by festive surge in injuries from falls

Scotland’s accident and emergency units have recorded their worst waiting time performance since records started as demand for the NHS reaches “unprecedented” levels.

Ministers admitted that a surge in demand in the leadup to Christmas had resulted in many A&E services being overwhelmed, with one in five patients waiting longer than four hours.

Official figures for the week ending 17 December showed only 81.1 per cent of people arriving at accident and emer- 0 Shona Robison: The number of cases is unprecedented gency rooms were seen within the four-hour target.

This was well below the Scottish Government’s 95 per cent target on waiting times and the lowest since the reporting of weekly A&E figures start- ed in February, 2015. The figure stood at 90.2 per cent in the same week last year. NHS leaders blamed freezing conditions for putting “exceptional” demand on the units.

More than 29,000 people attended A&E departments over the course of the week – about 3,200 more than the week before.

Much of the increase was attributed to weather-related falls and seasonal illness, with Health Secretary Shona Robison describing the number of cases as “unprecedented”.

Almost half of A&E patients at the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh had to wait longer than four hours.