Helena Vesty tours Greater Manchester's hospitals and shares how NHS leaders think each service is faring as the NHS continues to face immense pressure
Greater Manchester was hit with intense pressures this winter as strains on the NHS rose to unprecedented heights. But health bosses have admitted those same challenges will continue even as the spring approaches.
Inside A&E Emergency departments have been mired in huge attendance numbers in recent months, with extremely high numbers of patients becoming a feature of every hospital in Greater Manchester. “It’s really challenging [in urgent and emergency care]...
Staffing, too, continues to be a thorny problem at the centre of the demand on the NHS - there are simply not enough pairs of hands to deal with the numbers who need help. ”Our hospitals are running with fewer staff available,” shared Mr Banks, who said there had been some success in recruitment, but absence levels remain fuelled by burnout and sickness.
More beds occupied by people who could go home means fewer beds becoming free for new patients. Hence, long waits inside A&E and outside on ambulances. “But it also means that when we’ve got patients at the front door who need to be admitted for care and treatment, there is no space and there’s nowhere to go. That impacts on the delays that we and you are seeing at the front door.
North West Ambulance Service reported 8,313 ambulance hours lost to delays outside hospitals between April 2022 and January 2023. In MFT hospitals, for example, there has been an increase in patients spending more than 12 hours total time in the A&E departments as a result. “Not everywhere that delays for a long period of time in terms of handover hours actually delays outside and there's some hospitals where they do not delay outside. Wigan is an example where they will not delay outside because they've got adequate space inside to be able to manage the patients. However, their handover delays are significant in that area.
Across Manchester hospitals, there were 1,313 occurrences of patients waiting outside in an ambulance from April 2022 to the end of January 2023, with 246 at MRI, 33 at Wythenshawe and 1,034 at North Manchester. The number of patients waiting over 60 minutes for arrival to handover in Greater Manchester in the reporting period was 16,819. Manchester specifically accounted for 5,413 of those occurrences with the MRI seeing 2,183, North Manchester with 1,159, and Wythenshawe at 2,056.
“That was a really difficult decision to take. Roughly, in excess of 1,300 patients every week were therefore not being treated and, as a consequence, were being added to a waiting list. “With hard work and effort, we have seen a significant improvement in terms of how many patients are waiting beyond the time we would want them to wait since November. We ended up in a really difficult position, since November there’s been quite a significant improvement.”
Greater Manchester was disproportionately affected by the pandemic, reads the committee papers, with mortality rates more than 25 per cent higher than the national average. Black British people, those of South Asian descent and those living in more deprived areas were amongst the worst affected. But in November 2022 the figure was still 7.3 per cent. That represents an additional 450 staff absent from work across MFT compared to pre-pandemic.
If a patient cannot get the same surgery at another hospital in Greater Manchester, they could be offered the choice of travelling elsewhere in the country, explained Mr Banks. Councillors came out in force to support the pleas for national help by calling for a meeting with Secretary of State for Health Steve Barclay. Coun Pat Karney was among those who slammed underinvestment in the health service.
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