BEDS are being occupied by patients who no longer need to stay in hospital, new figures have revealed.

Some 24 beds are taken by people who don’t need to be in hospital on an average day at East Lancashire Hospitals Trust (ELHT).

NHS data for May shows patients at the trust spent a total of 739 days waiting to be discharged or transferred to a different care setting - equivalent to two years of waiting time.

The figures show that 77 per cent of these delays were caused by problems with the NHS and 22 per cent by issues with social care.

A ‘delayed transfer of care’ happens when a patient remains in a bed after being officially declared ready for transfer.

A report on delivering care for older people by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) highlighted concerns about government targets for delayed transfers of care.

The report, Beyond Barriers, cautioned that trusts focusing on trying to hit government targets might end up delivering lower-quality care as a result.

A CQC spokesman said: “As our report highlights, there is too much ineffective co-ordination of local health and care services, leading to fragmented care for older people.

“Our report recommends a single joint framework for measuring the performance of how agencies collectively deliver improved outcomes for older people.

“This would reflect the contribution of all health and care organisations, rather than relying primarily on information collected by acute hospitals.”

Across England, an average of almost 4,500 beds a day were blocked in May, representing roughly 3.8 per cent of all occupied beds. The government target is 3.5 per cent.

This resulted in a total of 139,204 ‘delayed’ days, equivalent to just under 400 years of lost time.

The national rate peaked in February 2017 at a rate of 6,660 beds per day, but has decreased steadily over the past year.

John Bannister, director of operations at ELHT, said East Lancashire has seen a ‘positive and welcome reduction’ in delayed discharges since the turn of the year.

He said: “Since March 2018 we have been under the national requirement of no more than 3.5 per cent of occupied bed days lost to such delays.

“In June this was its lowest-ever level at 2.72 per cent.

“This is great news for patients as they are not in hospital any longer than necessary and it means we have the beds available for those patients who require an emergency or unplanned admission.”

He added: “We recognise the importance of reducing delayed discharge and transfers of care.

“We continue to work collaboratively with all local health and social care partners."