Acute NHS hospitals in Shropshire have not yet eradicated the use of ‘corridors’ to care for patients, a meeting heard.
The board of directors of The Shrewsbury & Telford Hospitals NHS Trust (SaTH) was told that the situation has seen ‘incremental’ improvements since December and January.
And on Thursday morning the hospitals in the county’s two main towns had 117 ‘delayed discharge’ patients using 15 per cent of their total of 750 beds despite “no longer having a reason to be in care.”
“If they were receiving care outside of the hospitals we would not have corridor care,” said Ned Hobbs, the trust’s Chief Operating Officer, who reported the figures to the meeting.
“There is an awful lot more that we need to do.”
Andrew Morgan, the chair in common of both SaTH and Shropshire Community NHS Trust (Shropcom), told the meeting that the trust has been “buying home care” to provide a way to get patients out of the hospital.
Corridor care at Royal Shrewsbury Hospital was a focus of a Dispatches undercover report from the RSH last year which is still causing ripples across the local NHS.
The meeting was not told how many patients were being treated in ‘corridors’ and SaTH’s director of nursing said they were not “public thoroughfares” but specific areas of the hospitals.
Paula Gardner, the Director of Nursing, said: “Patients are not in the main corridors of the hospitals. Proper care and attention is given to people and there is always a nurse.
“But we are not where we want to be.”
The meeting was told that a recent visit by the Royal College of Nursing was “impressed” by care given to patients.
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“The difference was like night and day from the last time they came here last year,” said Ms Gardner.
Ms Gardner said the Dispatches expose had revealed that staff had nowhere to wash their hands.
The trust is carrying out “hand hygiene audits” and providing hand gel to patients and members heard that there still a job to do.
She told the board she is thinking of getting a “cardboard cutout of a nurse” with a message to remind staff to use soap and water to wash their hands when they are leaving wards.
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