The Nuffield Trust comments on the February 2016 combined performance summary

Commenting on the statistics covering February published this morning by NHS England, Candace Imison, Director of Policy at the Nuffield Trust, said:

It’s disappointing that for the second month in a row, the proportion of people seen, treated, admitted or discharged in less than four hours in February was the lowest since 2004, with almost 230,000 people having to wait longer than four hours.Candace Imison, Director of Policy, Nuffield Trust

“Today’s figures are the very visible symptoms of a system facing both increased pressure and severe financial strain.

“It’s disappointing that for the second month in a row, the proportion of people seen, treated, admitted or discharged in less than four hours in February was the lowest since 2004, with almost 230,000 people having to wait longer than four hours. But these delays are hardly surprising when you look at the number of patients who had to be admitted to hospital as emergencies – over 450,000 in February, 38,000 more than a year ago, despite a huge policy push to try and enable these people, mainly of them frail and elderly, to be treated at home or in the community (see note 2).

“This pressure on wards was in turn not helped by the number of patients in hospital beds whose medical treatment was finished, but who could not be discharged because there was not enough support available for them in the community. The number of patients delayed in this way in February was the second highest since the NHS began collecting records.

“Unfortunately we are not going to see any significant improvement in meeting the A&E four hour target until the both the number of patients admitted as emergencies, and the number who cannot be sent home, are reduced as well”.