Kent hospital tries to charge pensioner £582 for a bed – as NHS collapses under flu pressure

A flu-crippled NHS hospital threatened to charge a pensioner £582 a night if she refused to give up her bed to another patient.

A ‘stunned’ visitor to the ward told how a gang of four hospital staff ‘surrounded’ the woman and tried to intimidate her into leaving.

She is believed to have emphysema and a chest infection, ‘looked like she weighed five stone’ and said she lived alone.

Despite pleas to give her time to arrange care and transport, workers at The Princess Royal in Orpington, Kent told her she had to pay up or leave.

Patient groups today criticized the ‘strong-arm tactics’ used to free the bed, describing the behavior of hospital staff as ‘heartless’.

A hospital spokesperson has since apologized for any “confusion or distress caused” and admitted staff had wrongly suggested the patient would be fined.

It comes as the NHS struggles to cope with a surge in demand amid falling temperatures and a major flu outbreak.

King’s College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, which runs The Princess Royal, has seen the number of beds occupied by flu patients quadruple in the past month.

The latest figures from NHS England show that the Trust had an average of 52 beds a day filled with flu patients in the last week of December – up from just 12 a month earlier.

It has also struggled with bed blockers.

The Mail told earlier this month how the equivalent of 26 hospitals a day are filled with patients who are medically fit for discharge but cannot leave – often because of delays in securing a place in a care home or arranging care at home patient’s home.

The crisis is costing the NHS around £2 billion a year.

King’s College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust had an average of 88 bed blockers per night in December, compared to 82 in November.

On a typical day last month, 202 patients were deemed ready for discharge, but only 114 left their beds, for a discharge rate of just 56 percent.

The lack of available beds is hampering efforts to admit new patients to the Trust, with more than one in four ambulances (27 percent) taking longer than 30 minutes to transfer patients to A&E over Christmas and New Year .

Dennis Reed, director of Silver Voices, which campaigns for older patients, said: ‘An old, weak and sick lady, with no social support at home, being threatened with a huge fine if she doesn’t give up her bed says it all about the critical state of the NHS and the lack of empathy from some hospital managers.

‘This insensitive behavior within one Trust could be the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the strong-arm tactics used to free up hospital beds.

‘Ultimately the responsibility falls back on the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, who has kicked social care reform into the long grass and ensured that many more older patients will be forced back home with non-existent support available to promote their recovery.

“Rather than be ‘ashamed’, Wes Streeting should take action to prevent such bullies from being used in the future.”

A spokesperson for the Trust told the Mail: ‘Yesterday, when staff spoke to a patient who was fit to be discharged about his stay in hospital, staff wrongly suggested that the patient be billed for the ongoing costs of his hospital bed would be brought.

‘We can confirm that this is absolutely not the case, and we would like to apologize for any confusion or inconvenience caused.

‘Like other hospitals, charging patients would only be considered a possible option in very rare and exceptional circumstances, and in such cases where a patient with no further medical needs has repeatedly refused to leave the hospital over a period of time. , despite being well enough to do so, and having the right support mechanisms in place for their ongoing care.”