The health secretary and NHS executives are avoiding A&E departments as they cannot acknowledge the scale of the unfolding crisis when they have no solution, according to senior doctors.
A consultant, who works in one of Scotland’s busiest hospitals, today warns A&E departments are “overwhelmed and unsafe” while Humza Yousaf and NHS Scotland managers have no plan but to “cross their fingers and hope”.
“Is it surprising that politicians won’t come anywhere near us? How can the minister responsible visit an A&E ward where patients are waiting 12, 15, 20 hours for a bed and patients are waiting in ambulances for four hours before even getting inside?” said the consultant. “And our managers might struggle to find the department, never mind come to see what’s happening here. They are too busy telling people not to come to A&E unless they have to, as if that’s the problem.
“The problem is the people who really do need to be here and us being unable to see them for hours, never mind treat them, and then being unable to move them into the hospital because there are no beds. There is no candour from the executives or the politicians. Looking grave and issuing press releases is not the same as making our department safer.”
Fewer patients are visiting A&E than before the pandemic but are more seriously ill. There has also been an increasing number of Covid patients; longer stays for hospital patients; and more nurses and doctors ill or isolating. The senior doctor, who says the situation in casualty is the worst it has been since the start of the pandemic, fears Scots are starting to believe a state of over-stretched, dangerous crisis is the new normal in A&E departments.
The warning came days after figures revealed more than 1,000 patients spent more than 12 hours in A&E departments last week for the first time, while one in 10 waited eight hours or more.
Ambulance tailbacks at Scotland’s A&Es blamed on shortage of beds and staff
Dr John Thomson, vice-president of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine (RCEM), said the situation was the “biggest patient safety crisis in emergency care for a generation”.
He added: “Each week the crisis worsens. Scotland’s emergency care system is failing patients who are coming to harm and failing staff who are overworked, exhausted and burned out.”
Speaking to The Post, the consultant echoed his concerns, saying the target of 95% of A&E patients being seen within four hours was a fantasy and, in his hospital, the rate could be as lw as 35%: “Patients and staff are at risk of harm. That is a fact. The conditions are intense, relentless and dangerous. We are seeing fewer patients coming into A&E than before the pandemic but they are much sicker. They have waited longer to see their GP, they have waited longer to come to casualty. They are iller and they need more time, attention and treatment. That’s not happening.
“Meanwhile, we are losing staff, junior and senior, to other specialisms because a job in A&E is too hard.”
The Scottish Government denied the health secretary was reluctant to see the problems for himself, adding: “He frequently visits hospital departments to meet staff, and has regular conversations with the RCEM and other clinicians.
“He has regularly made public statements on how busy our A&E departments are. Waiting times are not where we would want them to be, we know the pandemic has been the biggest challenge our NHS has faced in its 73-year existence.
“With record levels of infections and Covid hospital occupancy, these last few weeks have been among the most challenging of the pandemic. Staff absences and a number of acutely unwell patients, resulting in longer stays, is also having an impact.”
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