Nottingham University Hospitals (NUH) trust has appealed to the public after declaring a critical incident due to “severe and sustained pressure” on its services. Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust said soaring demand, winter illnesses and staff sickness since Christmas have caused “significant and unacceptable delays” across its emergency department and hospital wards.
The trust has urged members of the public to only attend A&E in a genuine emergency or serious accident, as services struggle to cope. The move comes after four hospital trusts in south east England declared critical incidents on Monday following a surge in complex A&E admissions.
The declartion comes after four hospital trusts in southeast England declared critical incidents on Monday after a “surge” in complex A&E admissions.
Andrew Hall, chief operating officer at Nottingham University Hospitals, said the trust was facing “pressures like never before”.
“Despite our teams working tirelessly, demand far exceeds our capacity,” he said: “Declaring a critical incident is not a decision we have taken lightly, but it is necessary to protect patient safety.
“I am deeply sorry for the poor experience this is causing and ask everyone to treat our staff with kindness as they work through this extremely difficult period.”
Speaking on its Facebook page this afternoon (January 13), the trust said the A&E department at the Queen’s Medical Centre, which is designed to treat around 350 patients a day, has been regularly seeing more than 500 patients daily.
On its busiest day of the year so far, 7 January, a total of 550 patients attended A&E, placing further strain on frontline services.
NUH said demand for hospital beds has exceeded all forecasted modelling, resulting in unacceptable and lengthy waits on corridors, while staff continue to work under extreme pressure to manage record demand.
The trust said it will now reschedule some elective procedures to free up capacity for the most seriously ill patients.
Dr Manjeet Shehmar, medical director at NUH, said: “Our teams in our emergency department will continue to see the sickest patients first, which means that if you attend our ED at QMC for conditions that are not an emergency, then you will have an extremely long wait and may be redirected to use other services instead.
“We continue to ask the public to help us by only using ED in an emergency or serious accidents. For all other issues please ensure you have called 111 beforehand to be directed to the most appropriate service.”
Patients with planned appointments are advised to continue to attend as normal unless contacted by the trust, while friends or family are asked to collect patients as soon as possible after discharge.