Week when half of our hospitals said: We just can’t cope
NEARLY half the hospitals in England declared major alerts last week as the NHS winter crisis showed no signs of abating.
Doctors yesterday warned the worst may be still to come in the form of new flu outbreaks.
In the first week of January, 65 of 152 hospital trusts issued ‘operational pressure alerts’, which meant they could no longer cope and ‘patient flow’ was being affected. Six issued the highest alert level – ‘patient safety’ at risk.
Mark Holland, of the Society for Acute Medicine, said the problems came despite mild weather. ‘Hence we conclude that our services are unable to cope with the conditions of a normal winter,’ he said.
He added: ‘With the current cold snap about to bite, one would anticipate that nothing is going to improve very quickly.’
Research suggests that well over a quarter of emergency patients are having to wait more than four hours to be seen.
The vast majority of ambulance services are failing to hit their response targets, leaving the sick stranded.
Hospitals closed the doors to A&E and diverted patients elsewhere 39 times in the first week of January, declaring they could take no more. The figures, released by NHS
‘The flu peak is still to come’
England, will fuel the growing row about the funding of the Health Service.
A spokesman for Theresa May yesterday accepted the NHS was under pressure, but insisted the Government had fully funded a plan to transform and improve services.
A major cause of the crisis is the norovirus vomiting bug, cases of which have soared 77 per cent compared with last year. Nearly 1,000 hospital beds are out of bounds each day as a result.
‘Operational pressure alerts’ were issued 222 times in the six days to January 8, up nearly seven-fold on the 34 of the previous six days. In the worst-affected areas, 25 hospitals issued the alerts every single day between January 3 and January 8.
Dr Chris Moulton, of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, said: ‘It was an incredibly hard week in a very difficult winter. It is probably the most challenging it has been for 15 years. All hospitals are experiencing difficulties.’
Yet worse could be on the way, as experts warn that flu cases – a major source of hospital pressures – are yet to reach their peak. Already admissions for flu are running at nearly twice the level seen last year.
An NHS spokesman said: ‘The flu peak is probably still to come.’ Last year the flu outbreak did not reach its height until March.
Influenza can make a major difference to national mortality rates. This winter 32 people have died from confirmed cases, a quarter of them in the first week of January. This time last year only 19 deaths had been reported.
Another 84 patients have already been admitted to intensive care units, up from 51 last year.
Overall hospital admissions are up 96 per cent on last year.
The main flu strain in circulation, H3N2, is particularly dangerous for the elderly, which officials think is why admissions are so high.
Chris Hopson of NHS Providers said: ‘The majority of trusts are managing to keep their heads above water – just.
‘But the pressure on our hospital, ambulance, community and mental health services is unsustainable and the resilience of the system to cope with unexpected shocks, such as flu outbreaks, is impaired. So it is worrying that there is growing evidence of flu-related illness.’
NHS England says the current bad weather could make things worse, interfering with services and increasing the number of admissions.
Paul Cosford, medical director at Public Health England, said: ‘Think now about what you need to do to prepare: If you need vital medicine or food, get it before the bad weather arrives.’
A spokesman for the Royal College of Emergency Medicine said hospitals had now lost control of waiting times.
He said hospitals are cancelling non-urgent operations, but even that has not worked. ‘Unfortunately contributors have been unable to halt further decline. It is now beyond dispute that patient safety is being put at risk.’
The college’s research shows that only 74 per cent of patients at 60 trusts it monitors were seen within four hours in A&E, woefully short of the 95 per cent target.
Mark Porter, of the British Medical Association’s council, said: ‘It is extremely concerning that this many trusts in one week raised the alarm to say they can’t cope, and it shows the scale of the crisis in our NHS at the moment.’
A spokesman for Mrs May said: ‘We are investing money in the NHS. There will be an additional £10billion of funding by the end of this parliament – £4billion of that is going in at the start to kickstart the transformation of provision.’
The Department of Health said: ‘Hospitals are putting in place steps to cope with the extra demands winter brings – supported by an extra £400million of funding.’
Figures from the Royal College of Surgeons show a sharp rise in patients enduring long waits for operations. Over the past year an average of 193,406 people a month did not get surgery within the 18week target, compared with 139,240 the previous year.