James Evans MS has responded to today’s warning from NHS leaders about the rise of “corridor care”, saying the pressures driving the crisis are already having serious and dangerous consequences for people in Brecon & Radnorshire.
The Welsh NHS Confederation has said corridor care is “unsuitable, undignified and potentially unsafe” and that banning it without fixing the underlying causes would worsen ambulance delays and harm patients elsewhere in the system.
While Powys has no district general hospital and no A&E department, residents are directly affected by the knock-on impact of corridor care at the hospitals they rely on in England and other parts of Wales. James also highlighted the wider issues flagged by NHS leaders, including social care capacity and patient discharge delays. Across Wales, around 15% of hospital beds are occupied by people medically fit for discharge but with no available care package, causing a backlog that pushes pressure back through the entire system.
James Evans MS, Shadow Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care, said:
“No one in hospital should be treated in a corridor or receive ‘chair-care’. Yet it is happening too often in our major hospitals and A&E departments. I am fully supportive of the Royal College of Nursing’s call to end corridor care and make sure this becomes a ‘never-event’.
“No one is blaming the frontline staff in the large hospitals for this – this is a failure from the top, of Welsh Government and the Health Boards. We have seen bed capacity being reduced in recent years, yet demand continues to increase. Welsh Government is instructing hospitals to accept ambulance patients quicker to free up vehicles – which is quite right – but without giving additional support to the hospitals, these patients are ending up in corridors and chairs not for hours, but for days!
“We are in winter pressures right now, with high levels of flu, but Welsh Government should have planned for this, put in extra capacity. In Powys, our lack of social care capacity is a major contributor to this crisis. If people cannot be discharged safely with the support they need, hospitals fill up, ambulance handovers slow down, and patients are left waiting for care. Our local care providers and volunteers work incredibly hard, but they are being stretched beyond what is reasonable.”
