Festive A&E Target Missed

Accident and emergency patients faced longer waits to see a doctor this festive period.

Figures show the NHS dealt with almost 90percent of patients inside four hours between the 22nd of December and January the 4th.

That's well below the Scottish government's target of 95percent, and a decrease on the previous 12 months.

Health Secretary Shona Robison said it's been "a particularly challenging time" for A&E staff.

She said: “It is clear we must improve our performance – both in winter and year round – which is why we’ll go on increasing investment, improving systems and protecting staffing levels.

“Health board staff across Scotland have been working extremely hard to meet this demand and ensure long waits in A&E are minimised – and for this they have our thanks.

“However, across many health boards, delayed discharge is having a significant impact on the flow of patients through hospital and boards have informed us there has been an increase in seriously ill people presenting at A&E, who need admitted to hospital.

“I have already stated that reducing delayed discharge is a top priority for this government and we are continuing to work with health boards and local authorities to ensure effective co-ordination so that these patients, who are often very frail, can either get home or into a homely setting as quickly as possible.

Theresa Fyffe, RCN Scotland Director said political point scoring on targets is "all well and good", but if A&E departments here are England's is down to Scottish patients having surgery cancelled it "misses the point."

She said: "Our concern should be about patient care, not numbers.

“We’ve had scores of members get in touch with concerns about beds being opened up to allow patients to be transferred from A&E, but without the required number of nurses being put in place to look after those new patients. Patients up and down the country are having planned operations cancelled at the last minute because patients from A&E are now in the beds they were supposed to be in.

“I don’t think that 88.8% of patients being seen within four hours will be much comfort to people waiting for cancer surgery or hip replacements. And what about the patients with long term conditions who haven’t been able to see their specialist nurse for check-ups and treatment, because those nurses are working on wards to try to supplement the overstretched hospital workforce? If their conditions worsen, they could well be ending up at A&E themselves. And what about those people who have been transferred on from A&E within the four hour target but are now lying in a bed in the wrong ward?

“It’s time to stop thinking of A&E, and indeed hospital care, in isolation from the rest of health and social care. The whole system is creaking at the seams and the last few weeks have seen a perfect storm of conditions that demonstrate just how perilous the state of the NHS is. Future plans for the integration of health and social care are not going to be the panacea that some people seem to think they will be – simply better integrating care is not going to reduce demand. That’s exactly why we think the Scottish Government should review the whole of the health and social care system to find different ways of providing services and putting the whole system on a sustainable footing.”