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Here are two charts that put into perspective NHS performance in England in two key areas - waits for hospital treatment and the percentage of people seen at A&E within four hours - over the years.Alongside dealing with the pressures in emergency care, the NHS has been told it must prioritise tackling the backlog in routine treatment.less than 60% of people waiting under the target time of 18 weeks., before hitting 92% by the end of the Parliament.
Henderson said it's been particularly difficult in the past few years, with flu cases in particular “tipping people over”. A&E waiting times have been dominating headlines in Northern Ireland with reports of long waits across emergency departments since the Christmas period. From later this year the minister has set a target that at least 80% of patients will have commenced treatment, following triage, within two hours. To meet these targets the Department of Health has said there needs to be sustained investment and reform.A moment ago, we published the story of a woman whose elderly mother spent more than 30 hours in a corridor on a hospital trolley.
It urged people to "play their part" in reducing demand by getting winter vaccines, looking out for others and only using A&E "for major life-threatening illness and injuries".Liz Shearer told the BBC her elderly mother spent more than 30 hours in a corridor on a hospital trolley because there were no bays available.
“While I was there, there were at least eight ambulance crews waiting to hand over patients and obviously they are not out on the streets if they are there waiting.It was voted trust of the year in 2024 and South Warwickshire prides itself on a relatively smooth running A&E department.I was at the trust’s Warwick Hospital when the move was decided. The stats were bleak.
Waiting times in A&E and for ambulances deteriorated during December, although the scale of the delays, certainly for ambulances, are not as bad as they were two winters ago, which was the worst winter for the NHS for a generation. But both are still much better than they were two years ago, when response times hit their worst ever level.In December 71.1% were being seen in this time. That is broadly similar to what has been seen in the previous two winters.There has been a huge amount of focus on English hospitals this week with 20 NHS trusts declaring critical incidents. But all parts of the UK are feeling the strain.
And, with rates of flu still climbing in many countries, the fear is the situation could get worse before it gets better.Tyler Foyle, 25, from Amesbury, in Wiltshire, has a number of health conditions, including hypermobility spectrum disorder, which causes pain and stiffness in joints and means he has to attend hospital frequently.
Health and the NHS are consistently among the top topics you want to talk about, making up around one in 10 of the responses we get. The waiting list currently stands at 7.5 million, with more than three million people having already waited longer than the 18-week target. Starmer said his plan would reduce the number of long waits by nearly half a million over the next year. Here’s what it includes:
The nurse, who did not want to be named, said the prime minister should "sit in the A&E waiting room for 12 hours and see what we have to go through".A patient who asked to remain anonymous tells the BBC they were given a hand bell to ring rather than a nurse call bell as they waited for treatment in a hospital corridor.
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