NHS has lost ‘muscle memory’ on corridor care, minister says

The NHS has lost “muscle memory” about how to tackle corridor care, a health minister has said.

Karin Smyth said the problem was an “issue of clinical leadership and managerial leadership”, telling MPs she was a “strong supporter of managers… recognising what should be pretty basic and is known but doesn’t happen now”.

Ms Smyth made the comments during a Commons health and social care committee session  about corridor care on Wednesday. Last year,HSJ  revealed  that around one million accident and emergency patients had been placed on corridors or in other temporary spaces across a 12-month period.

The minister said: “I think we can’t underestimate what [is] sometimes called muscle memory loss about how to do things right.”

Last week, NHS England said trusts could “virtually eliminate” corridor care  with the right leadership, ordering executives to take personal charge of the problem.

Labour MP Danny Beales told the committee this week that the recommendations, which include executives walking corridors and senior leadership being present at discharge meetings, were “quite basic”.

Professor Tim Briggs, a surgeon and national director for clinical improvement, said: “The big thing that’s going to be required is cultural leadership change.”

Read full story (paywalled)

Source: HSJ, 12 March 2026

Related reading on the hub:

• HSSIB Investigation Report: Patient care in temporary care environments
• Corridor care: Patient Safety Learning’s response to the latest HSSIB report
• Corridor care guidance needs to move beyond what “should” happen and grapple honestly with why it isn’t
• The crisis of corridor care in the NHS: patient safety concerns and incident reporting