Health Foundation - Improving hospital discharge in England: the case for continued focus and support (31 March 2022)

Summary

This long read by the Health Foundation examines the challenges of discharging people from hospital, and looks at 'discharge to assess' (D2A) an approach to reducing the incidence of delayed discharge.

It outlines priorities for policymakers and the NHS and suggests next steps for managing hospital discharge.

Content

The article outlines factors that facilitate successful D2A, focused on effective cooperation across the NHS, social care and the voluntary sector.

• strong relationships and trust between colleagues across different sectors
• a shared understanding of the problems of delayed discharge and the benefits that successful discharge can yield
• collaborative working to design, test and iterate new approaches
• focus on quality
• space and flexibility for D2A to be adapted and improved
• adequately resources