Ambulance handover delays improve though pressure on hospitals ‘remains high’
Nearly one in five patients arriving by ambulance waited at least 30 minutes to be handed over.
Ambulance handover delays at A&E departments in England improved slightly last week, though hospital pressures “remain high”, figures show.
A total of 14,961 delays of at least 30 minutes were recorded across all hospital trusts in the seven days to January 16, representing 18% of all arrivals.
This is down from 23% in the previous week, which was the highest level so far this winter.
Some 7% of arrivals last week (5,610) took more than 60 minutes to be handed over to A&E teams, down from 10% in the previous week.
The figures have been published by NHS England.
A handover delay does not always mean a patient has waited in the ambulance.
They may have been moved into an A&E department, but staff were not available to complete the handover.
Analysis of the data by the PA news agency shows that University Hospitals Plymouth reported the highest proportion of ambulance handovers that were delayed by at least 30 minutes last week (58%), followed by University Hospitals Bristol & Weston (53%), Gloucestershire Hospitals (51%) and Torbay & South Devon (49%).
Royal Cornwall Hospitals topped the list for the proportion of arrivals that were delayed by more than an hour (41%), followed by University Hospitals Plymouth (39%), Torbay & South Devon (35%) and University Hospitals Bristol & Weston (34%).
Hospital pressures in England “remain high”, with staff facing a growing number of routine checks as well as ambulance arrivals, NHS England said.
More than 93% of general & acute beds were occupied last week, the equivalent of nearly 500 more adult patients per day than the previous week.
Staff absences due to Covid-19 have fallen week-on-week in every region, though most areas are still reporting higher numbers than at the start of December.
