£555k ambulance fine for Walsall Manor Hospital trust
Walsall Manor Hospital has been fined more than half a million pound this year for ambulance breaches which have affected hundreds of patients.
The ambulance service has declared people are being put at risk by crews being stuck at hospitals unable to leave.
Patients arriving by ambulance are supposed to be formally 'handed over' within half hour - 15 minutes to clinically transfer the care of the patient and 15 minutes for the crew to make the ambulance ready for the next person.
But between April last year and February there have been a total of 1,609 transfers which have taken longer than the target, while another 234 handover took longer than an hour.
Things did improve in February compared to January but the hospital still recorded 156 breaches in the month – 22 of which were over 60 minutes. The national target is to have zero incidents at all.
So far the ruling trust has been slapped with a fine totalling £555,800.
It is yet another consequence of the Manor’s A&E department coming under pressure particular during winter.
A West Midlands Ambulance Service (WMAS) spokesman said: “Like our own staff, the team in the hospital are working incredibly hard to provide the very highest standards of patient care.
"Only around a third of patients attending A&E arrive by ambulance so at times of peak demand, handover delays do occur.
"Every time one of our crews is delayed, it has a significant knock-on effect on our ability to respond to 999 calls in a timely manner, which puts patients at risk.
"We will continue to work closely with acute trusts to improve their handover times."
Unsurprisingly the key month of January saw the most handover breaches in the last year. There were 297 cases that took over 30 minutes and 62 that took longer than 60 minutes.
The Manor saw 6,401 total attendances to the emergency department in the month, 2951 of which were via an ambulance - 46 per cent.
National regulations mean the trust is fined £200 for every 30 minute breach and £1,000 for every 60 minute one.
The Walsall Healthcare Trust (WHT) board met yesterday - Thursday - where the latest performance figures were discussed.
A performance report said a raft of measures had been put in place to tackle the problem.
It stated: "The Discharge Lounge continues to open from 10am on a daily basis (weekdays) to pull patients from wards and provide early capacity.
"WMAS continue to attend the joint meeting with commissioners, WHT and Urgent Care Providers to support service improvements within ED and Urgent Care."
