Hundreds of Birmingham and Black Country patients forced to wait in ambulances outside overcrowded hospitals

Hundreds of West Midlands patients were forced to wait outside over-crowded hospitals in ambulances over the Christmas period, NHS figures have revealed.

One Birmingham hospital trust, Heart of Heart Of England NHS Foundation Trust, said there were more than 200 cases of patients forced to wait to be admitted in the seven days from December 25 to December 31.

They included 178 occasions when patients had to wait between 30 minutes and 60 minutes to be handed over to the hospital, and 25 cases of patients waiting more than an hour.

The trust runs three hospitals including Good Hope and Heartlands in Birmingham and Solihull Hospital.

In parts of the Black Country the situation was even more dire. Dudley Group NHS Trust, which runs Russells Hall Hospital in Dudley, recorded 344 cases of patients being forced to wait between 30 minutes and an hour - and 36 cases of patients waiting longer than an hour to be admitted.

Long ambulance waits have been seen as one symptom of the crisis facing the NHS this winter.

Health Minister Philip Dunne was summoned to the House of Commons on Monday to answer an urgent question from Labour Shadow Health Secretary Jonathan Ashworth about the state of the NHS.

And Prime Minister Theresa May admitted over the weekend that it had been necessary to cancel thousands of operations.

She told the BBC’s Andrew Marr show: “You mentioned operations being postponed - that was part of the plan.

“Of course we want to ensure that those operations can be reinstated as soon as possible, but it’s about making sure that those who most urgently need care are able to get that treatment when they need it.”

Birmingham MP Jack Dromey (Lab Erdington) said: “The NHS winter crisis is now seeing the sick and injured waiting in pain in ambulances that cannot transfer them to overcrowded accident and emergency wards.

“The crisis is likely to go from bad to even worse in unless the Government invests in these resources.”

University Hospitals Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust, which runs the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Edgbaston, recorded 83 cases of patients stuck in ambulances for up to an hour over the seven-day period, and nine occasions when they had to wait more than 60 minutes.

Sandwell and West Birmingham Hospitals NHS Trust, which runs City Hospital in Birmingham and Sandwell General Hospital in West Bromwich, had 76 cases of patients in ambulances for up to an hour and three patients who waited for longer than an hour.

Hospitals in England were advised to cancel all non-urgent operations and in-patient treatments until at least the end of January because A&E departments were facing extreme pressure over Christmas.

NHS England’s National Emergency Pressures Panel issued the advice, and also lifted the ban on mixed-sex wards.

Health bosses have admitted the NHS faces a crisis. Chief executive of the Royal College of Nursing Janet Davies last week said delayed admissions and cancelled operations showed “that almost every day last week, NHS hospitals in England were at bursting point”.

Ambulance handover delays from December 25 to December 31 2017