More than 14,000 NHS beds in use by patients ready to be discharged
Figures show more than 14,000 hospital beds in the NHS are being occupied by patients well enough to be discharged every day, as experts urge ministers to tackle the crisis.
The data emerged in a damning report which found that almost a fifth of health care providers had to wait weeks before people could be transferred into their care.
A survey of 568 care homes and home care providers in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland found wide regional variations, with no agreement on how a personâs social care would be paid for the most common reason for delayed admission to a care provider.
Others said incorrect or insufficient information from NHS hospital staff, a lack of communication, waiting times for patient care assessments or a lack of transport also contributed to delays preventing patients from leaving hospital.
Seventeen percent of respondents indicated that it takes an average of one to two weeks for someone to be discharged from hospital, while 7% indicated it takes three weeks or longer.
The East of England performed best when it came to discharged patients, with 96% of patients being readmitted to a care provider within a week.
Half of healthcare providers surveyed in Scotland said it took longer than a week to discharge patients; 15% in the West Midlands and 10% of providers in Yorkshire and the Humber said it took longer than three weeks to admit a patient.
According to Autumna, a healthcare guide that conducted the research, the samples from Wales and Northern Ireland were too small to provide reliable regional findings.
The latest NHS figures for England show that an average of 12,326 hospital patients per day were medically fit and ready to be discharged to various care settings in July, but this was not the case.
The latest NHS figures for Scotland show that the average number of beds occupied each day by patients who should have been discharged was 1,983 in June, up from 1,942 in May and the highest number ever recorded.
According to Prof Martin Green, chief executive of Care England, the report outlines a system that is âfailingâ and âwill only get worse unless corrective action is takenâ.
He added: âCare providers are frustrated and angry about the lack of a clear and strategic approach to discharge, and the fact that no one is providing a national perspective.
âWe constantly hear about bottlenecks within hospitals, the root cause of which is often a lack of a clear and strategic approach to discharging patients appropriately.â
The pressure on the NHS was often self-inflicted, he added, and was a symptom of a system that was âobsessedâ with process and had âforgottenâ that patients should be the priority.
Mike Padgham, chairman of the Independent Care Group, which represents social care providers in Yorkshire, said the report was the latest in a long line of reports painting a “bleak and unacceptable” picture.
âEnough is enough,â he said. âThe system needs to be reformed so that people can get the care they need, when and where they need it.â
Debbie Harris, founder of Autumna, said the findings were a âwake-up callâ to Keir Starmer and Wes Streeting that the system was broken and needed urgent reform.
âThe pressure will only increase as our population ages, so we need to fix the system now, before it completely collapses,â she said.
The NHS said it recognised the number of delayed discharges was âunacceptableâ and was working to improve the system.
The government said it was committed to reforming the social care sector and establishing a national health service, but gave no indication of when this would happen.