The Royal College of Physicians has responded to analysis from the Royal College of Emergency Medicine (RCEM) which has revealed that more than 250 deaths a week were associated with long A&E waits last year. More than 1.5 million patients requiring emergency care waited 12 hours or more.
The RCEM analysis, published in two briefing documents – Progress Against Delivery Plan – One Year On and Insights: Long Waits and Excess Deaths – comes after the UK government published the delivery plan for the recovery of urgent and emergency care services in January 2023. The plan aims to improve waiting times and patient experience through increasing capacity, growing the workforce, speeding up discharge from hospitals, expanding new services in the community, and helping people to access the right care first time.
RCP clinical vice president Dr John Dean said:
‘This new data from RCEM shows that patients continue to experience very long waits while they wait to be admitted for acute medical care in our hospitals. Expecting patients to wait for 12 hours in a corridor after being admitted with acute illness is unacceptable. People are coming to harm.
‘Hospitals urgently need additional beds, staff and capacity for inpatient care, as well as speedier transfers of care into the community when patients are ready to leave hospital. Vulnerable patients need better access to social care and the NHS must invest in intermediate care and admission prevention to reduce the need for hospital stays.’
Research from RCEM found:
- Hospital bed occupancy remains high, consistently averaging over 94%. More than 11,000 additional beds are required to achieve safe occupancy levels of 85%
- The number of patients admitted into hospital has risen by 10% one year on
- Recent figures show that a daily average of 13,690 patients remain in hospital after a decision to discharge them has been made, only 275 fewer than in January 2023.