A TOP doctor said the Royal Blackburn Hospital cannot continue to cope with the huge numbers of patients arriving at the doors of its emergency department.

Dr Ian Stanley, the hospital’s medical director, said it was ‘unsustainable’ for NHS services in East Lancashire to remain as they are, and there needs to be a huge effort to treat more patients at home or in the community.

MORE TOP STORIES:

The Lancashire Telegraph has reported how emergency care reached ‘crisis point’ over the weekend, with ambulances forced to queue for up to two hours to hand patients over to hospital staff.

And new figures published on Tuesday showed that in the three months to December, there were 27,814 people who turned up at the department, the highest number it has ever dealt with. The situation was mirrored across the country.

Overall, 5.6 million patients turned up to emergency departments during the three months up to the end of December.

Addenbrooke’s Hospital, Cambridge, Peterborough and Stamford Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, University Hospitals of North Midlands in Staffordshire, Walsall Manor Hospital and the Royal Bolton Hospital have all declared major incidents.

Lancashire Telegraph:

Dr Stanley, who cancelled annual leave to remain in the department, said: “The system hasn’t worked properly and it isn’t sustainable. We need to redesign services to help people manage their long term conditions, rather than having them turn up at A&E.

“Many of the patients here still need care but not an acute bed, but we haven’t been able to discharge patients into social care as efficiently as we would have liked.”

He said the hospital, which deals with patients from across Pennine Lancashire, was close to declaring a ‘major incident’ on Saturday, but said shutting the doors to new patients was not a realistic option.

There were 50 patients in the emergency department at one point, despite it only being designed for 25, and Dr Stanley added: “The staff have been phenomenal because they’ve been working at full capacity for several days and still maintained their professionalism. It’s actually been inspiring to see them be so welcoming and considerate with patients when they’re under this much pressure.”

One of the main frustrations has been the inability to discharge elderly patients who have ongoing needs, such as residential care or home care packages. Of about 600 beds over the weekend, around 100 were ‘blocked’ by patients waiting to be discharged to alternative care, which brought many of the delays in A&E.

Dr Stanley added: “We’ve not been able to discharge patients as efficiently as we’ve wanted. Many of them need care, but not an acute bed and we’ve not been able to get the right care in place. We need to work together with the councils and commissioners to resolve this.”

Councils have been forced to make severe cuts to social care budgets in recent years, due to the Government’s austerity measures since the economic crisis. Blackburn with Darwen Council has slashed its adult services budget by £7 million since 2012/13, while Lancashire County Council (LCC) has had to reduce its overall spending on adult services, health and wellbeing by £13 million since last year.

Although care packages are still available to the same patients, delays appear to have been caused when no social services staff are available to complete assessments for discharge.

Azhar Ali, health boss at LCC, said: “We’ve got social workers in hospital who are working flat out to help early discharge, but the funding for social care has been hit hard, while demand has increased. When you cut funding it will inevitably have an impact on service delivery.”

However, Steve Tingle of Blackburn with Darwen Council claimed cuts to social care budgets were not to blame. He said more people are being supported at homes or residential care than ever before, with weekend social workers drafted in and additional beds offered.