More than 1,000 patients are spending longer than 12 hours in A&E departments every day, a new report suggests. The Royal College of Emergency Medicine (RCEM) released figures showing that in 2021 some 1,047 patients a day, on average, were waiting 12 hours or longer from their time of arrival.
The College raised concerns over “alarming” levels of patients in emergency departments as it described current data on 12-hour waits as the “tip of the iceberg”. It said that levels of “crowding” in emergency departments “indicate that the health service is unable to meet the needs of patients with the current levels of resource and capacity”.
Official figures show that, in March, more than 20,000 patients spent more than 12 hours in emergency departments after doctors had decided they were sick enough to warrant a hospital stay. But the RCEM said that current 12-hour wait figures are a “gross under-representation of the reality” as “far greater numbers of patients experience extreme waits of 12 hours or more from their time of arrival”.
