Some 10 per cent of care homes in the region said it takes three weeks for a patient to be discharged into their care. There are calls for the new Government to reform the discharge system as figures showed that in York Hospital alone, there were over 900 “lost bed days” in June where patients medically fit to leave have been unable to do so as there has been nowhere suitable for them to go. Advertisement Advertisement Did you know with a Digital subscription to Yorkshire Post, you can get access to all of our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more.
That equates to an entire ward’s worth of beds being occupied every day, hospital board papers suggested. A report from Autumna, a social care directory, surveyed 500 care homes and home care agencies on their experiences of the hospital discharge system. A further 10 per cent of those questioned said it took between one and two weeks for discharge to be completed.
And 30 per cent of those questioned said they had difficulty communicating with discharge teams. A lack of agreement on how the person’s social care would be paid for was the most common reason for delayed admission to a care provider, the survey found, with more than 200 respondents citing this reason. Advertisement Advertisement Others said wrong or insufficient information provided to them from hospital discharge teams, a lack of communication, waits for patients to have care assessments or transport not being agreed all contributed to delays in people being moved from hospital to a care provider.
One care provider in the region surveyed said: “Discharges are usually delayed because medication isn't ready or transport didn't turn up. The information on discharge assessments is often wrong because they are completed by non-medical staff who rely on the information given to them from the ward staff. Some 93 per cent of care providers nationally would like to see government reform of the hospital discharge process.
A spokesperson for York and Scarborough Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust said: “We recognise patient flow is one of the greatest challenges facing every part of the NHS and hospitals have huge pressure on beds from patients who no longer meet the criteria to reside. Advertisement Advertisement “The NHS is also facing a sustained high level of pressure, and our Trust is no different. Partner organisations in social care are facing the same workforce and demand issues and we recognise we have elderly or frail patients medically fit for discharge but are delayed.
“Clearly, hospital is not the best place for these patients, and we would like to see fewer patients delayed. To address this, we are working closely with the NHS Humber and North Yorkshire Integrated Care Board (ICB), and local authorities to find better solutions.” A Department for Health spokesperson said: “Our broken NHS hospital discharge system is blocked by an inadequate and neglected social care system.
“This government is committed to reforming the adult social care sector and building a National Care Service to deliver high-quality care across the country and ease pressure on the NHS so it is fit for the future.” Advertisement Advertisement It comes after new Health Secretary Wes Streeting declared “the policy of the government is that the NHS is currently broken,” in the days after Labour’s seismic election victory. But the new government have yet to outline detailed plans to reform the social care system.
A leading campaigner for social care reform has demanded the new Government urgently tackle hospital discharges. Mike Padgham, chair of the North Yorkshire based Independent Care Group said: “We are enormously disappointed to see this situation is not improving. This is the latest in a long line of reports that paint a bleak and unacceptable picture for people who need care.
Advertisement Advertisement “Enough is enough, the system is in need of reform so that people can get the care they need, when and where they need it. In our region we are working with health bodies and care commissioners to come up with some solutions. “We need to streamline the system.
At the moment we have an unnecessarily complex system which delays people from getting where they want to be. "We need a system that allows hospitals to discharge people directly to care providers to get people moving more quickly.” Mr Padgham has called on Wes Streeting to divert some NHS funding towards social care.
Advertisement Advertisement He said: “There is a very clear case for some funding to be reallocated from the NHS to social care so that we increase the availability of care so that it is there when and where people need it, rather than the postcode lottery we currently have. “There is a dreadful social and health impact of people being in hospital when they don’t need to be as well as a huge financial impact of people being in costly hospital beds when they should be cared for elsewhere. “For a government which is intent on making every penny count, spending millions on people being unnecessarily in a hospital bed looks like a very obvious place where urgent action is needed.
” The latest NHS figures, for July, show that across England an average of 22,310 hospital patients a day were ready to be discharged – to a number of settings rather than just to care homes. Advertisement Advertisement Of these, a total of 9,984 (45 per cent) were discharged and 12,326 (55 per cent) were not, according to NHS England. The proportion of medically fit patients who were discharged varied across the regions, with 60% discharged from hospitals each day on average in Eastern England, but only 36% in the North West of England.
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