Bed blocking and a drop in standards at the Isle of Wight’s only hospital has been seen as a result of the Island’s care crisis.
Pressure has continued to mount for St Mary’s Hospital and its staff since June, with top bosses saying patient levels were ‘very congested and very concerning’. It was at the end of October that Island Echo reported on the bed blocking situation faced by staff at the Isle of Wight NHS Trust.
There’s an average of 55 patients in St Mary’s who do not need to be there but there is no care available to safely discharge them.
It has been revealed there are more than 300 job vacancies in the care sector on the Isle of Wight – nearly 8% of the workforce. The situation has been called a ‘critical risk’ for the hospital by the Isle of Wight NHS Trust’s chief operating officer Joe Smyth, as it causes a lack of beds for those needing to be admitted and increased wait times in the emergency department.
Overcrowding, patients being nursed out of bays and people being accommodated overnight in the emergency department as they wait for a bed to become available have all been reported recently to the trust board.
Patient levels are remaining steady, with more than 5,000 people going to the emergency departments each month, but performance levels are declining. Between August and October, the number of patients seen and discharged or admitted in 4 hours has fallen from 81.4% to 76.5%.
At Thursday’s meeting, Mr Smyth said staff had been outstanding and could not be working harder to manage demand. He asked Islanders to use other avenues for support, like 111 or GPs, unless it was a real emergency.
He apologised for the wait’s people may experience if they come to the emergency department but asked for their patience and an understanding of the pressure the hospital is under.
Dr Lesley Stevens, the trust’s community director, said there seemed to be a disconnect between health settings and the outside world, as the outside world ‘had gone back to normal.’ She asked Islanders to continue to protect the NHS by following Covid guidance.
Pressures will also be put on the hospital as the Island enters winter, with increases in flu and other illnesses and changes made to COVID pathways in the hospital.
Should additional bed capacity be needed at short notice a contingency plan has been approved to open an extra ward, which could provide either 15 or 28 beds.
Darren Cattell, the trust’s deputy chief executive, said winter is not going to be straightforward or easy.
the consequences of the governments short sighted covid jab policy are beginning to show themselves.
Next it will be patients who need a bed and treatment, dying because there is no bed available due to bed blocking, as a result of the lack of space in the care home sector, which has been exacerbated by staff leaving over the no jab, no job policy.
Best make carers redundant then for not being vaccinated, send the elderly to the hospital to be nursed by unvaccinated people. You cannot make this BS up.
So the cottage hospitals who took this overspill were thought of as unessary. How wrong they were. Build them now.
I remember the cottage hospital up at shanklin old village when I was a kid!
A very sad situation – not improved by the horrendous property prices on the Island. Many health workers who would like to work here, cannot, as they cannot afford to rent or buy a property. This includes young Doctors.
The schools and hospitals are then forced to get staff from agencies – at great expense, which doesn’t go to the person working, but to the agencies. Yes, they should have kept the cottage hospitals and they should also have more affordable housing for key workers. As this is practically non existent – I am not sure who is going to staff any additional ward that may be opened.
I do tire of this constant call for ‘affordable housing for key workers’!
What it needs is affordable housing FULL STOP.
No-one was clapping for all of the shop workers, utility workers ad nauseum during the early Pandemic.
Why are some people unnecessarily put on pedestals and, for want of a better term ‘worshipped’?!
This is very sad. Very sad indeed. Lot’s of various problems causing this. Boris’s Britain=The Last Days of Rome.
So called bed blocking is not a new problem is it, Just like winter pressures happens annually. Need a bigger hospital or a temporary Nightingale for Covid patients. And if nurses and Drs cannot afford rent or buy over here they sure won’t be able to pay City prices on the mainland
Well the CQC rating will disappear very quickly, back to “Special Measures”
Needs the coucil to pay care agencies more money so that the staff can recieve pay increase, shame on the council for expecting care staff to work for peanuts
you pay the higher council tax then colleen – because I am not wiling to see more of the money I make to cover my bills and buy my food, taken from me, against my will and handed to the NHS sector, which is already a burden on society, because of the loss of focus – the NHS is about mending the broken and healing the sick – not paying for lipo, gender reassignment or having to put up with an endless queue of whiners in A and E with broken fingernails and hurt feelings.
A&E packed , its because you can’t seen or get through to g.ps . If you ring 111 or do an e consult the questions are designed to send you to A&E anything but the surgery. Feel sorry for A&E staff they’re dealing with every ailment ! Even a district nurse said she’s not seen a g.p for months where are they ???
They are hiding and laughing at us all while still on full pay