KGH in bottom five for A&E waiting times

New NHS statistics for A&E attendances between January and March this year show just 68.8 per of patients were seen in less than four hours.

That’s well below the target of 90 per cent.

KGH’s chief operating officer Rebecca Brown says the department is not fit for purpose.

But a £450,000 refurb, which started this week, should go some way to helping the hospital hit its target which it hasn’t hit since August 2014.

Miss Brown said: “The performance figures published this month demonstrate just how much pressure Kettering General Hospital’s urgent care services are under and how much pressure acute hospital services are under in Northamptonshire.

“The 68.8 per cent figure for four-hour waits in A&E for January to March 2018 was a period of very high demand both at KGH and across the country.

“It is widely recognised that our current A&E department is not fit for purpose and this week we started a £450,000 refurbishment to free up more space for clinical examinations converting offices and store rooms into treatment areas.”

Other trusts to fall well short of their target include: The Princess Alexandra Hospital (64.7 per cent), Norfolk And Norwich University Hospitals (66.2 per cent), Shrewsbury And Telford Hospital (66.9 per cent) and United Lincolnshire Hospitals (67.1 per cent).

The hospital has also set a target date of 2022 for a new urgent care hub on the Rothwell Road site, which will further alleviate pressure.

Miss Brown added: “In the long term we are looking to build a multi-million-pound urgent care hub on the hospital site to better address urgent care demand and an outline business case for that has been submitted to NHS Improvement.

“But there are many factors which lead to people waiting longer in A&E and not all of them are due to the department itself.

“There are waits in the department for patients to be admitted to a hospital bed.

“We are working very hard to improve flow within the hospital and to ensure our processes are as timely as possible.

“However, there is a significant issue in Northamptonshire with delayed discharge and we are working with our partners to address that.

“There will be no quick fixes to this issue and it will involve a lot of work to redesign systems and ensure there is enough health and social care capacity in the county to meet population and demand pressures.”

Nationally, waiting times were at their worst level since records began.