Hampshire Hospitals eighth worst for 'bed blocking'

Figures from the BBC’s Shared Data Unit, which works in partnership with local news, reveal that 81 per cent of patients at Hampshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (HHFT) are unable to leave hospital each day, on average, despite being classed as fit to do so.

The worst hospital trust in the country was Stockport NHS Foundation Trust, where the figure is 93 per cent.

The statistics, which show the highest daily proportion of patients unable to leave hospital despite being classed as eligible from July 2022 to June 2023, show that more than 13,000 people are unable to leave hospitals in England each day, despite being classed as fit to leave.

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Almost half of those were because patients were waiting for care packages to begin in a facility or at home, but many were also waiting for community hospital beds.

While levels of delays have remained stable over the course of the last year nationally, the winter peak seen in 2022 was almost double what it was a decade ago.

The Government released £600m in 2023-24, which aims to help councils recruit and retain more care workers, but health leaders say the plans fall short of the reform required.

“At the heart of this is persistent understaffing across all care settings,” said the Royal College of Nursing director Patricia Marquis.

“We would like to see a long-term plan for social care that matches the ambitions of the recent NHS Long-term Workforce Plan. Put simply, we need more nursing staff in the community and social care sector.”

She added: “No patient should spend longer in hospital than necessary, but a lack of social or home care is leaving many waiting to be discharged - when they should be getting more appropriate care elsewhere.”

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Delayed discharges occur when a patient in a hospital bed is classed as medically fit to leave but does not do so at the end of that day.

They have been a major concern for hospital leaders for the best part of a decade.

Back in April 2013, a study by the Health Foundation found delayed discharges added extra cost to hospitals, hampered their ability to free up space in emergency departments and had a negative effect on, mainly, elderly patients who sometimes deteriorate as a consequence of delayed discharge.

Ten years on - and despite repeated calls from medical bodies such as the British Medical Association (BMA) to reform the pathways by which patients leave hospitals – delayed discharges have followed a generally rising trend, particularly in the winter months.

There were around 60,000 weekly delayed discharges in the winter peak of 2010, compared to a record 140,000 in December 2022.

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HHFT said it is working on “innovative solutions” to tackle the problem.

A spokesperson for the trust told the Gazette: “Ensuring people are cared for in the best place for them and their families is a vital part of high-quality care. It is a challenge to help patients get home, safely, as soon as they are well enough to leave hospital and the system to get home is governed by a range of factors that are sometimes beyond the direct control of the hospital.

“To put this into context, most recently 94 per cent of people who were still in hospital, despite being ready to leave, required support from partner organisations.

“We are working on innovative solutions, such as the use of virtual wards where people are monitored in the comfort of their own home. We also ask that, where possible, families support the process by staying in contact with the ward, providing suitable clothing for the patient, understanding their ongoing medication needs, and helping with transport home if they are able.

“We are focused on what we can do within the hospital to ensure patients are supported to get home quickly, and we are supported by colleagues in partner organisations to try and address this difficult issue.”

A spokesperson for the Department of Health and Social Care said: “It is vital people receive the right care in the right place, and we are working to ensure patients are discharged safely from hospital, as soon as they are medically fit to do so.

"A record £1.6 billion investment is supporting this, on top of the £700 million to ease hospital pressures over last winter and the £42.6 million fund to support innovation in adult social care.

“To further bolster the workforce, we are continuing our Made With Care recruitment campaign – designed to reach millions of people – and the average pay for care workers has also increased.

"Staff retention is equally as important, which is why we are also investing almost £2 billion over two years to help councils support the workforce.”