A Liverpool NHS trust is missing all of its key targets, according to latest data.
Liverpool University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (LUHFT) is falling short with regard to waiting lists, time spent in A&E, cancer treatment and diagnosis. As a result, it has been ranked 66th out of 120 NHS trusts in England in a NHS data tracker produced by the Telegraph.
LUHFT, which runs Aintree University Hospital, Royal Liverpool University Hospital, Broadgreen Hospital and Liverpool University Dental Hospital, serves around 630,000 people across Merseyside. The data from NHS England, accurate up to August 11, 2022, gave LUHFT an average score of 79.3% against its targets, placing it around the middle of health service trusts across England.
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Though LUHFT is failing to meet every single one of its targets, no trust in England is hitting all of them.
The target for waiting lists is for 92% of patients to be treated within 18 weeks. However, the trust achieved 52%, while England has an average of 62%.
The trust's target is for 96% of cancer patients to begin treatment within a month. It has achieved 93%, slightly ahead of England's average of 92%. In terms of diagnosis, the target is for 99% of diagnostic tests for detecting diseases to be given in 6 weeks. The trust achieved 88%, well ahead of England's average of 73%.
Likewise, the A&E target for 95% of patients to be seen within four hours. At LUHFT, 67% of patients are seen within that time, compared with an average of 71% across England. In July, 8.715 patients at LUHFT were waiting over four hours to be seen in A&E.
England saw its worst A&E performance on record in July. 71% of people attending emergency departments that month waited less than four hours to be admitted, discharged or transferred, the lowest proportion since records began in November 2010.
In July, At LUHFT, 33.4% of people waited more than four hours. The proportion waiting less than four hours in major A&Es across England was just 57.0%, meaning two in five patients faced long waits. This is despite the overall number of attendances falling from 2.18 million in June to 2.16 million in July.
Where it was decided those in A&E needed to be admitted, those people faced the prospect of long waits for a ward bed. A total of 29,317 people across England waited more than 12 hours in A&E to be admitted to a ward in July.
That is the highest number on record, up from 22,034 in June, and was 5,000 more people facing long waits for beds than the previous high of 24,138 in April this year. In July 2019, 452 people waited more than 12 hours for admission.
Dr Vishal Sharma, chair of BMA consultants committee, said the situation in emergency departments in early summer is resembling the darkest winters. He said: “These latest statistics are truly dire and show the scale of the challenges faced by the NHS and its staff, and the worrying impact this is having on patient care.
“Workforce shortages, staff absences and a lack of capacity in social care to discharge patients into, all combine to create an unsafe environment for patients with doctors and their colleagues facing impossible dilemmas. Staff are doing their absolute best but the odds are completely stacked against them, and working at this level of intensity is completely unsustainable.”
Liverpool University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust declined to comment.
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