Bristol NHS patients face longest wait in England for a hospital bed

Patients at a city's hospital trust are waiting longer to be admitted for urgent treatment than anywhere else in England, it has emerged.

In October nearly 600 people needing urgent care at Bristol Royal Infirmary and Weston General Hospital (USBW) waited more than 12 hours for a bed.

The hospital trust said slow discharge processes had, in part, led to the delays.

Unison has voiced its concerns about patients waiting in ambulances

According to NHS England, last month there were more than 7,059 patients in England waiting more than 12 hours to be admitted to hospitals from emergency departments.

A significant proportion of those, 594 patients, were at University Hospitals Bristol and Weston NHS Foundation Trust.

Dr Emma Redfern, interim medical director USBW said: "We've got very strict infection control guidance where patients with Covid have to be managed in a different ward to those without."

"We have a slow discharge process, as you know, so all that is impacting on the ability for patients to move out of the emergency department in the timeframe we'd like them to move out leading to delays and backlogs," added Dr Redfern.

It has led to ambulances queuing outside accident and emergency which unions say is having a big impact.

Shane Clark, Unison South West said: "The problem is when those ambulances are at hospitals they are not out responding to those 999 calls and when they are coming back to hospital undoubtedly those patients are having long waits on the back of ambulances."

The trust said all patients arriving by ambulance are triaged and medical investigations begin in the back of the ambulance if required.