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Annual payments for contaminated blood bereaved

People whose spouse or partner died as a result of the contaminated blood scandal are to receive financial help. Annual payments of up to £33,500 will be given to those whose loved one died after contracting HIV or hepatitis C having been given infected blood.

About 5,000 people, including 99 from Northern Ireland, were infected by what has been described as "the worst scandal in the history of the NHS".

The health minister said those who had been bereaved had not been forgotten.

Robin Swann added: "I have listened to their experiences of how contaminated blood has impacted on their lives and the sacrifices they have had to make.

"I sincerely hope this annual financial support will provide some long-term financial certainty as well as recognition for those bereaved through contaminated blood."

The contaminated blood scandal resulted in people who had haemophilia being treated with blood infected with hepatitis C or HIV in the 1970s and 1980s. 

At the time the UK was struggling to keep up with demand for the Factor VIII blood clotting treatment, so supplies were imported from the US. But much of the human blood plasma used to make it came from donors such as prison inmates and drug-users who sold their blood. Those groups were at higher risk of blood-borne viruses.

Victims have campaigned for decades, saying the risks were never explained to them and the scandal was covered up.

An ongoing public inquiry has been hearing harrowing stories from people across the UK about how lives had been destroyed by the blood.

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Source: BBC News, 1 March 2021

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Annual checks can lengthen life

A group set-up following the Winterbourne View scandal is urging more people with learning disabilities to attend their annual health check-up.

Healthwatch South Gloucestershire said regular health checks could prevent people from dying unnecessarily.

It formed after BBC Panorama exposed abuse of patients at Winterbourne View hospital 10 years ago. Only about 36% of people with learning difficulties are believed to have an annual GP health check-up.

The Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS). said the lack of regular, medical observations contributed to them having a life expectancy of 20 years lower than in the wider population.

Healthwatch South Gloucestershire, a regional, independent health and social care champion, has created a checklist to encourage more people to attend appointments to help them improve their life expectancy.

Vicky Marriott from the group said: "It is our unrelenting mission to listen and share people's lived experience so that the information informs how health and social care services improve.

"We recently listened to people with learning disabilities and their families and developed with them an accessible info-sheet packed full of easy-to-read explanations about the lifesaving benefits of annual health checks."

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Source: BBC News, 1 June 2021

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Annual breast cancer checks could save 1,000 lives a year, says women’s health tsar

Offering women annual breast cancer checks could save 1,000 lives a year, the Government’s women’s health tsar has said.

Dame Lesley Regan said that the current system of screening women aged 50 to 70 once every three years was “not based on scientific evidence”.

The UK’s breast screening programme has the longest gap between screens in the world. In the US, it is every one or two years, and in Europe, it is every two years.

Dame Lesley, who is also a professor of obstetrics and gynaecology at Imperial College London, claimed that the decision to give women mammograms once every three years had been based on the budgets available in the Eighties, when checks were introduced. 

However, she said that more recent studies showed annual mammograms could save significant numbers of lives. 

On Tuesday, she told the launch of the Hologic Global Women’s Health Index in London: “If [someone] has a mammogram which is reported as normal today and she developed, for example, a precancerous lesion next month, she will then be waiting [until her next check], when it may well have become invasive, in the belief that she’s fine.

“If you have yearly mammography – and I appreciate that’s an expensive resource – there are very good studies demonstrating how many lives you save.”

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Source: The Telegraph, 25 January 2023

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Anger over UK's failure to ban breast implants linked to 61 cancer cases

At least 61 women in the UK have been diagnosed with a potentially fatal cancer linked to breast implants, but the type they received continues to be used, with no plans by the regulator to follow France and Australia in banning them.

Lawyers for more than 40 of the women, who are bringing legal action against the manufacturers as well as the clinics and doctors who carried out the surgery, say the textured implants linked to anaplastic large cell lymphoma (ALCL) should be withdrawn from the market. Smooth implants are available instead, which have no proven connection to the cancer of the white blood cells.

The Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) says the disease is very rare, but Sarah Moore, a solicitor at Leigh Day law firm, believes there are more cases than the regulator is aware of. “I think there has been misdiagnosis and under-diagnosis, and I think we have to bear in mind that in the last 18 months there have been 17 more reported cases of ALCL,” she said.

The leading manufacturer of textured implants, Allergan, has withdrawn them from worldwide sale. In December 2018 its European kitemark for the implants expired – the French agency that had granted certification had asked for extra safety data that the company said it could not provide in time. They have not been on sale in Europe since then. The US authorities asked the company to recall its textured implants in July 2019 and Allergan took them off the market.

France and Australia have since banned the sales of all textured implants, although neither has suggested that women should actively seek to have them removed.

In the UK, other brands of textured implants are still in use. Neither NHS England, the NHS Business Services Authority nor the MHRA could say how many had been given to women in the NHS after a mastectomy for breast cancer.

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Source: The Guardian, 7 January 2020

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Anger at plans to roll back Covid vaccines to under-11s in England

The decision to reduce the number of children who are offered Covid jabs has prompted outcry from parent groups and academics.

The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) said children who had not turned 5 by the end of last month would not be offered a vaccination, in line with advice published by the UK’s Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) in February 2022. UKHSA said the offer of Covid jabs to healthy 5 to 11-year-olds was always meant to be temporary.

UKHSA’s Green Book, which provides information on the vaccine rollout for public health professionals, states: “This one-off programme applies to those aged 5 to 11 years, including those who turn 5 years of age before the end of August 2022".

“Subject to further clarification, on-going eligibility in 2022/23, after the one off-programme, is expected to be for children in the academic years where children are aged 11 or 12 years.”

However, Prof Christina Pagel, of University College London, criticised the move.

“JCVI itself considered there to be a benefit to young children to be vaccinated – even if most of them had already been infected,” she said.

“There is also the additional benefit to children of providing additional protection from developing long Covid, missing school during the acute illness and reducing transmission to household members, other children and teachers.”

Pagel said that at least one serious Covid wave was expected later this year, but that many children about to start school would now have to wait six years for vaccination, with likely relatively frequent infections in that time.

“When we know there is a safe and effective vaccine available this seems unjustifiable to me,” said Pagel, adding that – while rare – children had died from Covid.

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Source: The Guardian, 6 September 2022

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Anger at daughter’s sepsis death fuels my campaign

Jason Watkins, a British actor, has urged A&E units to look again at procedures surrounding infants as he has channels his anger at his young daughter’s death from sepsis into trying to “improve the system”.

The actor said that his fury at the death of Maude aged two on New Year’s Day 2011 led him to smash up his shower.

“It wasn’t anger at any individual, it was anger at fate. Why should we deserve this?” he told Andy Coulson’s Crisis What Crisis? podcast.

“You feel really vulnerable and there’s a sort of rage against that. And there are all these different ways of resolving and wrestling out of this horrible dark pit that you’re in."

He now campaigns for the UK Sepsis Trust.

“I was never angry at any individual,” he said. “My anger was fuelled into trying to work out better ways of dealing with sepsis, or even more than that, the way that we look at infants in A&E. Because you know, it’s a funding issue, it’s an organisational issue. It’s another conversation.

“Because I had identified that there wasn’t an individual at fault in the hospital, it has to be the system. So we’ve got to improve it. My anger is fuelled into that. There’s no bitterness. Nobody made a technical mistake, it’s just nobody really thought of the possibilities of what could be happening.

“For me the whole of looking at infants arriving at A&E needs to be looked at again. Because if I say that Maude died twelve years ago, and that the ombudsman report about sepsis a couple of months ago said that nothing had changed about sepsis, now, that was like a body-blow, that makes me feel sick even thinking about it now, because we’ve worked so hard over that time.”

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Source: The Times, 1 February 2024

 

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Anger as some infected blood payouts put on hold

Some victims of the infected blood scandal have been told interim compensation payments of £100,000 due to be made before Christmas have been put on hold.

It is thought at least 10 bereaved families have received letters saying applications approved this month cannot now proceed until they submit new paperwork.

More than 30,000 people in the UK were infected with HIV and hepatitis C after being given contaminated blood products in the 1970s and 1980s.

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Source: BBC online, 1 December 2024

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Anger after NHS Trust says it has no plans to publish 'independent' review into deaths of three young people

Families have blasted a NHS Trust after it said it did not intend to publish an independent review into their loved ones deaths. Three young people died in nine months at the same mental health unit.

A Coroner was told last week that the review will be "ready" this month. Rowan Thompson, 18, died while a patient at the unit, based in the former Prestwich Hospital, Bury, in October 2020, followed by Charlie Millers, 17, in December that year, and Ania Sohail, 21, in June last year.

Earlier this year, Greater Manchester Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust (GMMH), which runs the hospital, commissioned an 'external report' into the deaths. A pre-inquest hearing into the death of Rowan - who used the pronoun 'they' - heard that the full report would be available for the coroner to read 'on or around September 30'.

Asked by the Manchester Evening News if the review would be published a spokesperson for the Trust said the Trust "always act on the wishes of the family regarding publication of reports," adding "and so in line with this we have no immediate plans to make the report public."

But the parents of both Rowan Thompson and Charlie Mllers said they wanted the report publishing. Charlie's mother, Sam, said: "We want it published. It needs to be put out there, otherwise there is no point in having it. We are hoping they (The Trust) will learn lessons. We want answers but it should also be published for the benefit of the wider public - and the parents of other young people who are being treated in that unit."

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Source: The Manchester News, 13 September 2022

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Anaesthetic devices 'vulnerable to hackers'

A type of anaesthetic machine that has been used in NHS hospitals can be hacked and controlled from afar if left accessible on a hospital computer network, says CyberMDX, a cyber-security company. For example, a successful attacker would be able to change the amount of anaesthetic delivered to a patient or alarms designed to alert anaesthetists to any danger could be silenced.

GE Healthcare, which makes the machines, said there was no "direct patient risk". But CyberMDX's research suggested the Aespire and Aestiva 7100 and 7900 devices could be targeted by hackers if left accessible on hospital computer networks.

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Source: BBC News, 10 July 2019

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An open letter to MPs on the impact of a no deal Brexit on health and care

In an open letter to MPs, The King's Fund, the Health Foundation and Nuffield Trust have summarised the four major areas where the impact of a no deal Brexit could be felt most sharply in health and care. 

There is a very real risk that leaving the EU without an agreement could exacerbate the workforce crisis in health and care, drive up demand for already hard-pressed services, hinder the supply of medicines and other vital supplies, and stretch the public finances which pay for healthcare.

They conclude that a no deal Brexit could cause significant harm to health and social care services and the people who rely on them.

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Source: The King's Fund, 3 September 2019

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An invisible medical shortage: Oxygen

Oxygen is vital to many medical procedures. But a safe, affordable supply is severely lacking around the world, according to a new report.

At the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, millions of people in poor nations died literally gasping for breath, even in hospitals. What they lacked was medical oxygen, which is in short supply in much of the world.

On Monday, a panel of experts published a comprehensive report on the shortage. Each year, the report noted, more than 370 million people worldwide need oxygen as part of their medical care, but fewer than 1 in 3 receive it, jeopardising the health and lives of those who do not. Access to safe and affordable medical oxygen is especially limited in low- and middle-income nations.

“The need is very urgent,” said Dr. Hamish Graham, a pediatrician and a lead author of the report. “We know that there’s more epidemics coming, and there’ll be another pandemic, probably like Covid, within the next 15 to 20 years.”

The report, published in The Lancet Global Health, comes just weeks after the Trump administration froze foreign aid programmes, including some that could improve access to oxygen.

Boosting the availability of medical oxygen would require an investment of about $6.8 billion, the report noted. “Within the current climate, that’s obviously going to become a bit more of a challenge,” said Carina King, an infectious disease epidemiologist at the Karolinska Institute and a lead author of the report.

“We’re not pitting oxygen against other priorities, but rather that it should be embedded within all of those programs and within those priorities,” Dr. King said. “It’s completely fundamental to a functioning health system.”

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Source: The New York Times, 17 February 2025

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An exercise trial for Long Covid is being criticised by some patients

A proposed exercise trial for Long Covid is being criticised by some of the patients the government-funded researchers want to study.

The trial is part of the Researching COVID to Enhance Recovery (RECOVER) initiative, funded by the US government for $1.15 billion over four years. It aims to study Long Covid and help find treatments for the millions of people experiencing a range of long-lasting symptoms, including extreme fatigue, brain fog and shortness of breath.

The exercise study protocol has not been finalised, but it will test physical therapy at different intensity levels, tailored to the patient’s capabilities, and aim to improve endurance, said Adrian Hernandez, executive director of Duke Clinical Research Institute.

Some Long Covid advocates, however, say that any exercise trial could be potentially dangerous for long-covid patients with myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME/CFS), also known as chronic fatigue syndrome.

Studies show that people with ME/CFS don’t have the same response to physical exertion as healthy individuals, and many ME/CFS patients report a worsening of symptoms after even small amounts of activity. This crash is called post-exertional malaise.

Advocates now worry that Long Covid patients with ME/CFS could be similarly harmed if they take part in any exercise study.

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Source: Washington Post, 22 May 2023

Further reading on the hub:

Understanding Covid-19 as a vascular disease and its implications for exercise

 

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An embarrassing but predictable end to Scotland's National Care Service

The Scottish government is scrapping its plans to create a National Care Service.

It is an embarrassing but perhaps predictable end to years of ambitious talk about finally coming up with a solution to the social care crisis.

In a statement at Holyrood, the government tore up parts of the bill that would require major structural changes to the Scottish social care system.

The downfall of the plan wasn't money or lack of ambition necessarily. And there was cross-party agreement on what needed to be done. The problem was a frustrating lack of consensus on how to get there.

It is also the end of the process that has been costly too. More than £30m has already been spent on planning the policy cover the last three years.

In 2021, Ms Sturgeon branded the National Care Service the "most ambitious reform since devolution".

Now, the plan is in tatters, and it tells us a lot about how difficult social care reform is and what might lie in store for the Westminster government.

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Source: Sky News, 27 January 2025

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An amputee's wife had to "carry him to the toilet" after her husband was sent home from hospital without a care plan

An amputee's wife having to "carry him to the toilet" after her husband was sent home from hospital without a care plan was just one of many findings in a report into vascular services at Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board in north Wales.

The critical report by the Royal College of Surgeons England makes five urgent recommendations "to address patient safety risks".

Part one of the report, published last summer, made nine urgent recommendations and raised issues including too many patient transfers to the centralised hub, a lack of vascular beds and frequent delays in transfers.

The final part of the report, published on 3 February, focussed on the clinical records of 44 patients dating from 2014 - five years before centralisation - to July 2021, two years after the Ysbyty Glan Clwyd hub opened.

Assessors were "extremely concerned" about the case of a man where a decision was made to "amputate the foot rather than proceed to a below-the-knee amputation as the primary procedure".

The report adds: "The review team also noted that the patient had been discharged without a care plan and that the patient's wife was having to 'carry him to the toilet'."

It also highlights an "inappropriate" decision to offer a patient an "unnecessary and futile" amputation when "palliation and conservative therapy should have been considered instead".

Referring to that case, the report added that the risk from "major amputation was extremely high".

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Source: BBC News, 3 February 2022

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An ‘explosion’ in nurse lecturer cuts risks nursing jobs and patient safety

The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) is warning that a rapid rise in the number of nurse lecturer redundancies and severances shows the higher education financial crisis is spreading through nursing courses in England and posing a risk to domestic workforce plans.

This comes just days after the UK government announced immigration plans which could lead to an exodus of international nursing staff, and poses a serious risk to patient safety.

The RCN believes the UK government must take action to protect all nursing courses. The capacity and state of the educator workforce must be a key consideration in nursing workforce planning. The RCN say the crisis in higher education is a real threat to the supply of nurses into the workforce and poses a serious risk to patient safety, potentially derailing the government’s new NHS 10-Year Health Plan due to be published this summer.

A nurse educator workforce strategy and funded action plan which addresses recruitment and retention issues is needed, alongside those planned for the NHS and NHS workforce.

Freedom of Information requests, sent by the RCN to universities in England offering nursing courses, have revealed nurse educator jobs decreased in 65% of institutions between August 2024 and February 2025.

Nurse educators have a critical role to play in ensuring we have a nursing workforce that's sufficiently able and equipped to deliver high quality, innovative, safe and effective care to meet current and future population needs. They're essential to growing the nursing profession and keeping patients safe.

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Source: RCN, 15 May 2025

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Americans stockpile abortion pills and hormones ahead of ‘reproductive apocalypse’ under Trump

When the presidential election results were handed down on Wednesday, Rebecca Gomperts, the founder of Aid Access, the No 1 supplier of abortion pills by mail in the United States, was huddled in a Paris apartment with her team of eight American physicians and 15 support staff. The group – which usually operates remotely, shipping out more than 9,000 abortion pills a month – had convened in person before the election, knowing they might have to spring into action.

They were right: as news of Trump’s victory spread, the website received more than 5,000 requests for abortion pills in less than 12 hours – a surge even larger than the day after Roe v Wade fell. “I can see all the new requests ticking in as we’re talking,” Gomperts said in a phone call on Wednesday afternoon. “We’ve never seen this before.”

The scenario repeated itself across the country as news of Trump’s victory broke, with women’s and trans health providers getting inundated with requests for services that their patients feared might be banned in a Trump administration. The telehealth service Wisp saw a 300% increase in requests for emergency contraception; the abortion pill finder site Plan C saw a 625% increase in traffic.

“Clearly, people are trying to plan for the reproductive apocalypse that we anticipate will be happening under a Trump presidency,” said Elisa Wells, the co-founder of Plan C.

Dr Crystal Beal, meanwhile, was dealing with an influx of emails on Wednesday from trans patients concerned about their access to hormones and hormone-blocking therapy. Beal runs a site called QueerDoc, which provides estrogen, testosterone and hormone-blocking drugs. Trump is hostile to trans rights, vowing to punish doctors who provide gender-affirming care to minors, and Beal’s patients wanted to know how to protect themselves from a second Trump administration.

By early on Wednesday afternoon, QueerDoc had already received more messages that day than it would in a typical week.

“Some of it is ‘How can I safeguard my access to medication?’” Beal said. “Some of it is ‘Should I change [the gender on] my legal documents back so I’m safer? Should I stop taking medication so I’m safer?’”

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Source: The Guardian, 7 November 2024

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Americans spend more time living with diseases than rest of world, study shows

Americans spend more time living with diseases than people from other countries, according to a new study.

The American Medical Association has published its latest findings, revealing that Americans live with diseases for an average of 12.4 years. Mental and substance-use disorders, as well as musculoskeletal diseases, are main contributors to the years lived with disability in the US, per the study.

Women in the US exhibited a 2.6-year higher so-called healthspan-lifespan gap (representing the number of years spent sick) than men, increasing from 12.2 to 13.7 years or 32% beyond the global mean for women.

The latest overall healthspan-lifespan gap in the US marks an increase from 10.9 years in 2000 to 12.4 years in 2024, resulting in a 29% higher gap than the global mean.

Globally, the healthspan-lifespan gap has widened over the last 20 years, extending to 9.6 years from 8.5 years in 2000 – a 13% increase.

Following the US in the largest healthspan-lifespan gaps were Australia at 12.1 years, New Zealand at 11.8 years, the UK and Northern Ireland at 11.3 years and Norway at 11.2 years. By contrast, the smallest healthspan-lifespan gaps were seen in Lesotho at 6.5 years, Central African Republic at 6.7 years, Somalia and Kiribati at 6.8 years and and Micronesia at 7 years.

Describing the results, the study’s authors, Armin Garmany and Andre Terzic, said: “These results underscore that around the world, while people live longer, they live a greater number of years burdened by disease.”

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Source: The Guardian, 11 December 2024

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American Medical Association (AMA) releases AI governance toolkit for health systems

The American Medical Association (AMA) has released new guidance for health systems looking to develop and implement artificial intelligence within their organisation.

The new Governance for Augmented Intelligence toolkit, built in collaboration with Manatt Health, is an eight-step module. It guides health systems from the initial steps of establishing executive accountability and governance structure through policy development, vendor evaluation, oversight and organisational readiness for the launch of new AI tools.

The toolkit also includes worksheets, sample forms, example AI policy documents and other resources for organisations to reference and can be completed by physicians for Continuing Medical Education credit.

“There is excitement about the transformative potential of AI to enhance diagnostic accuracy, personalize treatments, reduce administrative and documentation burden, and speed up advances in biomedical science,” the toolkit reads. “At the same time, there is concern about AI's potential to worsen bias, increase privacy risks, introduce new liability issues and offer seemingly convincing yet ultimately incorrect conclusions or recommendations that could affect patient care.

“Establishing AI governance is important to ensure AI technologies are implemented into care settings in a safe, ethical and responsible manner.”

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Source: Fierce Healthcare, 18 August 2025

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American Hospital Association opposes HHS interoperability rule: 6 things to know

The American Hospital Association (AHA) has expressed its opposition to parts of a new HHS interoperability rule aiming to facilitate better healthcare data exchange.

The proposed Health Data, Technology, and Interoperability: Patient Engagement, Information Sharing, and Public Health Interoperability rule to "advance interoperability, improve transparency, and support the access, exchange, and use of electronic health information" was published on 5 August.

In a letter on 4 October, AHA said it supports parts of the rule: aligning CMS application programming interface requirements and recommendations; continuing to develop U.S. Core Data for Interoperability (USCDI) standards; committing to protect patient data; improving public health data interoperability; rolling out the Trusted Exchange Framework and Common Agreement (TEFCA); and revising information blocking request-response criteria.

However, they are concerned that providers would still be held to a higher accountability standard for data sharing, USCDI version deadlines are too aggressive, new encryption requirements are burdensome, and TEFCA's current governance structure may be inadequate."

While the AHA supports prior authorisation application programming interface certifications, the group said payers, like providers, should also have mandatory, rather than voluntary, standards to "ensure that protecting the privacy of patient data is prioritized."

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Source: Becker's Health IT, 7 October 2024

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American Academy of Pediatrics calls for prioritizing in-person learning

The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) has called for in-person learning to be prioritised and for schools to prepare to address the mental health needs of their students. 

The AAP has also urged all who are eligible to get vaccinated, to do so, and recommends a layered approach in making schools safe for all such as wearing masks even if vaccinated. 

Sonja O’Leary, MD, FAAP, chair of the AAP Council on School Health has said “We need to prioritize getting children back into schools alongside their friends and their teachers -- and we all play a role in making sure it happens safely”. 

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Source: American Academy of Pediatrics, 19 July 2021

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America's ERs are swamped with seriously ill patients, although many don’t have covid

Inside the emergency department at Sparrow Hospital in Lansing, Michigan, staff members are struggling to care for patients showing up much sicker than they’ve ever seen.

Tiffani Dusang, the ER’s nursing director, practically vibrates with pent-up anxiety, looking at patients lying on a long line of stretchers pushed up against the beige walls of the hospital hallways. “It’s hard to watch,” she said.

But there’s nothing she can do. The ER’s 72 rooms are already filled.

“I always feel very, very bad when I walk down the hallway and see that people are in pain, or needing to sleep, or needing quiet. But they have to be in the hallway with, as you can see, 10 or 15 people walking by every minute,” Dusang said.

The scene is a stark contrast to where this US emergency department — and thousands of others — were at the start of the pandemic. Except for initial hot spots like New York City, in spring 2020 many ERs across the country were often eerily empty. Terrified of contracting covid-19, people who were sick with other things did their best to stay away from hospitals. Visits to emergency rooms dropped to half their typical levels, according to the Epic Health Research Network, and didn’t fully rebound until this summer.

But now, they’re too full. Even in parts of the country where covid isn’t overwhelming the health system, patients are showing up to the ER sicker than before the pandemic, their diseases more advanced and in need of more complicated care.

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Source: Kaiser Health News, 29 October 2021

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Ambulances waiting up to five hours as SE trust feels covid pressure

A trust in the south east is coming under increasing pressure from a growing number of covid patients, leading to long delays in ambulance handovers.

HSJ has been told that ambulances have been waiting up to five hours to hand over patients at Medway Foundation Trust, which has around 90 covid patients. 

The trust is currently continuing with elective work but covid patients are taking up close to 20% of its beds. Sources have told HSJ that bed occupancy at the trust is already very high – with a high proportion of acutely ill patients - and there are issues with discharging patients into nursing homes which is affecting the ability to admit patients swiftly through A&E.

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Source: HSJ, 11 November 2020

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Ambulances taking 90 minutes to get to 999 calls

Patients with emergencies such as heart attacks and strokes in England had to wait more than 90 minutes on average for an ambulance at the end of 2022.

It came after a sharp deterioration in 999 response times in December - they were nearly twice as bad as November.

Record worst waits were also recorded for life-threatening cardiac arrests, while A&E waits of over four-hours reached their highest level ever.

Patient groups warned the delays would be leading to real harm.

Combined, the data - released by NHS England - represents the worst-ever set of emergency care figures since modern records began in 2004.

The figures show:

Average waits of more than 90 minutes to reach emergency calls such as heart attacks - five times longer than the target time - with waits of over 150 minutes in some regions.

Response times for the highest priority calls, such as cardiac arrests, taking close to 11 minutes - 4 minutes longer than they should.

More than a third of patients in A&E waiting longer than 4 hours.

One in seven patients waiting more than 12 hours for a bed on a ward when they need to be admitted.

But there has been some progress with the waiting list for routine treatment falling slightly, to 7.19 million by the end of November.

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Source: BBC News, 12 January 2023

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Ambulances ‘waste vital time’ on prison call-outs

Ambulance crews are wasting “significant” amounts of time being called out unnecessarily to prisons across England, the health safety watchdog has said.

One NHS trust told investigators it dealt with 5,000 calls to 999 from prison staff across its region in 2023.

Overall the research found that almost three in four calls from prisons did not need an ambulance response, compared with one in eight calls from the general population.

On one occasion, several crews, including an air ambulance, were dispatched to an “unresponsive” inmate who was thought to be unconscious, the watchdog said.

On arrival they found the patient was simply refusing to answer questions.

One anonymous paramedic told investigators that “we waste vital time driving to a prison for a call which then gets cancelled, and we’ve just added that time on to the response to someone who [really] needs us”.

The report by the Health Services Safety Investigations Body (HSSIB), external found that prisons often encouraged a “low-risk response” when inmates were injured or fell ill.

Some prison control rooms were told to call 999 immediately and then wait for an on-site nurse to examine the patient, and then stand down the ambulance if it was not needed.

“You end up with a system that doesn't work for anybody,” said the HSSIB’s senior investigator Dave Fassam.

"It's putting pressure on prison staff who are very busy... and paramedics who don't want to be called to a scenario that doesn't warrant them being there."

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Source: BBC News, 29 August 2024

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Ambulances ‘lose’ 55,000 hours in one week during handover delays

Hours lost to ambulance handover delays, and the numbers of ambulances waiting more than an hour outside hospitals hit new highs in the week after Christmas.

Data published this morning by NHS England revealed nearly 55,000 hours were lost to delays between 26 December and 1 January and 18,720 ambulances had to wait more than an hour to handover patients as emergency departments struggled, with many trusts declaring critical incidents.

The number of hour-plus delays followed previous years’ trend of a slight dip in the week leading up to Christmas followed by an acceleration afterwards. However, levels this year were more than twice those seen in 2021 and three times those of the previous two years.

Read full story (paywalled)

Source: HSJ, 6 January 2023

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