A and E "patient stacking" lunacy

A&E patients 'left in ambulances for hours'

Extract from Telegraph article:

"Seriously ill patients are left for hours in ambulances instead of being immediately admitted to accident and emergency departments to meet a Government target on treatment times, it was claimed yesterday.

The practice of "patient stacking" has left some waiting for up to five hours because A&E units have refused to admit them until they can be treated within the four-hour time limit.

Unison, the public sector union, said the practice poses a danger to other patients because ambulances detained as "waiting rooms" cannot answer new 999 calls.

Mary Maguire, a spokesman for the union, said: "This happens time and time again. It is an appalling waste of resources. We should not use ambulances as waiting rooms.

"A 16-year-old terminally ill cancer patient died after waiting over an hour for an ambulance to transfer him. Three ambulances could have reached him but they were tied up waiting to hand over patients to A&E."

Dr Steve Field, the chairman of the Royal College of GPs, called the situation ''entirely inappropriate and unacceptable".

Evidence of patient stacking is revealed in the official ''turnaround time" data released by seven of England's 11 regional ambulance services.

The figures show that over the past 15 months at least 44,000 delays were reported by the ambulance services. In some cases the delays were up to five hours."

This "patient stacking" is lunacy!

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Parents are taking their children to accident and emergency departments unnecessarily

A&E units 'stretched' as child patients rise - Telegraph

Extract:

"Parents are taking their children to accident and emergency departments unnecessarily and are clogging up the system, the head of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health said.

Dr Patricia Hamilton told The Daily Telegraph in an exclusive interview that front-line services for children are under increasing pressure and cannot continue safely without changes being made or more doctors being introduced.

Parents are now more willing to take their child to A&E with a minor problem, such as a fever, instead of dealing with it at home or calling their GP, she said. The fact that family doctors have dropped out-of-hours services has made the situation more difficult.

Dr Hamilton said that minor cases need to be treated elsewhere, as A&E paediatricians are also seeing a rise in binge drinking among children, attention deficit disorder and allergies."

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Lose weight by eating less salt! Go on! - Try it! - You will feel so much better!
How to Lose weight!

See my website http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/.html
(The site does not sell anything and has no banners or sponsors or adverts - just helpful information.)

http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/story.html - my 'political' page

http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/socio.html - wider implications

Read my Mensa article on Obesity and the Salt Connection

See Sodium in foods and

Associated health conditions

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Proposed reforms of A and E could put lives at risk.

A & E reform could put lives at greater risk - Sunday Telegraph

Extract:

"Patients' lives will be put at risk by a major shake-up of accident and emergency departments, a secret report by senior doctors has warned.

The professional bodies representing A & E doctors say the new system - which could see casualty departments operating without back-up services such as intensive care, paediatrics and surgery - is too dangerous.

Desperately sick children taken to casualty by anxious parents could fall victim to the system's reliance on a "drive-by" ambulance policy, under which 999 crews are instructed to take callers to the "right" hospital, not necessarily the nearest."