A Birmingham hospital found to be falling short on emergency care targets has been criticised by a Government health 'tsar'.
Professor Sir George Alberti visited Good Hope Hospital in Sutton Cold-field last month following an inspection by Department of Health officials after the trust repeatedly failed to meet the target of seeing 98 per cent of its A&E patients within four hours.
Sir George's report, which is to be discussed on Monday at the hospital's board meeting, highlights the need to improve communication between departments, claiming that "services within the hospital had become fragmented".
* Tell us your view on this story. Get in touch by email, messageboard or by sending a web letter to the editor *
Sir George also suggested doctors should spend more time with patients after admission rather than focus on those in the short stay ward.
The report states: "Poor performance relates particularly to medical admissions and waiting for beds although other parts of the process could be accelerated.
"I suspect that better use of beds would ensue if all community and hospital beds were viewed as a single pool and run jointly by the acute trust and PCT.
"Many of the problems with emergency admissions stem from the poor bed availability.
"A new medical ward should be created, this should be linked to closing a surgical ward. This would free up surgical beds as patients going to a medical unit will have shorter length of stay than other outliers."
Andrew Walker, the trust's director of operations, said: "On a month-by-month basis we have been meeting the 98 per cent four-hour target.
"However we have not been achieving it consistently enough for a number of weeks, which is why we welcomed the Department of Health's offer of expert advice.
"We have already acted on some of Professor Alberti's recommendations and the others are being worked on as a matter of urgency by a new working group."
