WIREDGOV

Danielle Jefferies, Policy Analyst at The King’s Fund responded to the latest NHS performance statistics 

‘It’s been a tough start to the year for NHS patients and staff, and these performance stats show the NHS is not yet out of the woods. 
‘Hospitals are still under incredible pressure, with bed occupancy running higher than this time last year at 95 per cent. At the same time, staff absences remain high at more than 45,000 a day and ongoing industrial disputes will likely continue to impact patient care. 

‘Patients are still facing delays in urgent and emergency care services, with 42,735 people stuck on trolleys in A&E departments when they should be admitted to a hospital bed. However, there is some positive news, with average ambulance response times for conditions like heart attack and stroke down to 32 minutes from 93 minutes the previous month. This improvement appears to be thanks to lower numbers of 999 calls and swifter ambulances handovers at A&E departments, among other things.

‘This week marks one year since the government published its plan to bring down the backlog of planned hospital care. Thanks to the efforts of NHS staff, waits of two years or more have been almost eradicated, but these figures show that the overall waiting list has grown to 7.2 million and the number of people waiting more than 18 months has started to creep back up. Sadly, there are no quick fixes and busting the backlog will take many years of hard work.  

‘Services outside of hospitals are also under strain. There are still around 14,000 medically-fit patients stranded in hospital beds, due in part to the fact social care and NHS community-based services do not have the resources needed to meet demand. 

‘The unfortunate reality is that the road to recovery for the health and care system is long, with growing financial pressures, staffing shortages, and an NHS in crisis, all amounting to waiting lists being miles off where they should be under national targets.’