Devon and Cornwall hospitals discharge patients to care hotel

Hospitals in Devon and Cornwall are discharging patients into a "care hotel" to free up beds amid winter pressure on the NHS.

Health bosses confirmed "medically fit guests" with social care needs were being released from hospitals in both counties to a hotel in Plymouth.

Cornwall Partnership NHS Foundation Trust confirmed it was in "discussions" to open a similar facility.

NHS Devon said care hotels were a "positive measure" to reduce pressure.

Medical experts have warned the pressures are expected to get worse in January amid the "hardest winter ever".

NHS Devon has block-booked 40 beds across two floors at the Leonardo Hotel in Plymouth, 10 of which are for "guests" from Cornwall.

Some patients discharged from Derriford Hospital will stay at the hotel, it confirmed, while others will be there to "prevent them from being admitted to hospital".

Louise Jackson, health and care manager for Age UK, said care hotels were "unlikely to be appropriate settings".

She told the BBC: "This is another sticking plaster, whereas what we need is sustained core investment."

And Prof Martin Green, chief executive of Care England, said care hotels should be a "last resort".

He told the BBC: "It would be better if there were a systematic way to get social care right and stop people going into hospital."

A spokeswoman for NHS Devon said care hotels were "one of many positive measures" to reduce pressure.

She said the move was to provide social care to medically fit people who "need additional living support after a stay in hospital or to prevent them from needing to be admitted".

She said infection control meant care and hotel guests were protected and feedback had been positive.

The Cornwall trust, which manages sites including Royal Cornwall Hospital, said they were "in discussions to set up a facility similar to a care hotel that was in operation last year".

It said details were yet to be confirmed and care hotels were a "tried and tested model".

Cornwall Council said there were "complex pressures" on social care and they were aiming to reduce delays from admission to discharge through "new ways of working".

The BBC has contacted Abicare, the care agency at the hotel, Plymouth City Council, and Devon County Council, for comment.

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