The number of patients left to wait in ambulances for more than an hour outside hospital accident and emergency departments has quadrupled in a year, according to official data.
Leaked NHS statistics reveal that about 28,900 ambulance handovers lasting more than an hour were recorded in England last month, compared with 7,800 in the same month last year.
Ambulance services across Britain are in crisis, with many patients having to wait more than 12 hours outside crowded A&Es due to unprecedented demand, infection control measures and staff shortages.
Last week NHS chiefs ordered hospital trusts to “eliminate” ambulance queues outside hospitals after two deaths were linked to handover delays. A letter sent to all trusts warned that there was a “risk to patient safety” and instructed them to stop using ambulances as emergency “cubicles”.
The leaked data, seen by the Health Service Journal (HSJ), showed that the weekly total of hour-long delays rose from about 2,000 at the end of October 2019 to about 8,000 last week.
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The biggest increase in delays was in University Hospitals Birmingham (UHB) NHS Foundation Trust, which had 2,098 hour-long waits — up by 1,339 (176 per cent) from last year. The trust has had the highest Covid-19 admissions in the country, according to the HSJ, with A&E attendances regularly above 1,250 per day, compared with about 900 before the pandemic.
UHB was followed by Portsmouth Hospitals University National Health Service Trust (up 1,079) and University Hospitals Bristol and Weston NHS Foundation Trust (up 817).
NHS England said: “The NHS has already set out a ten-point action plan to prepare for significant demand this winter, and has now gone further by writing to trusts and systems asking for further, system-wide action to be taken to prevent ambulance handover delays with immediate effect.
“Staff have gone above and beyond over the last year, contending with record levels of A&E attendances and ambulance callouts, all while treating more than 470,000 seriously ill Covid patients — anyone who needs the NHS should come forward through the appropriate route so staff can help you with the best option for your care.”
On October 27 ambulance leaders described the “highest level of emergency activity in history” amid reports and photographs from across the country of ambulances backed up outside A&E departments.
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Patients have also been facing lengthy delays getting through to 999 and 111 because of a shortage of call handlers. Last month waits of up to eight hours for an ambulance were already happening and it was predicted that six-hour waits were likely to become common.
Sajid Javid, the health secretary, admitted that there were already “shortages” of staff responding to 111 and emergency 999 calls last month. He warned that, with the pandemic continuing, this winter would be particularly tough on resources.
