Winter situation report (11 – 17 December)
A&E closures and diverts: There were no A&E closures this week. There were a total of 12 A&E diverts this week, eight fewer than the week prior and the same number as this week last year.
Ambulance arrivals: A total of 85,923 patients arrived by ambulance. An increase of 2% since last week and up by 23.9% compared to the same week last year.
Ambulance handovers: 33.1% of ambulance handovers were delayed by 30 minutes or more, down from 33.8% last week. 14.2% were delayed by 60 minutes or more. This is down from 15.2% last week. A total of 28,966 hours were lost to ambulance handover delays.
Critical care: Adult critical care bed occupancy is at 81.6% this week; this is a similar level to the week before (81.7%) and the same week last year (81.6%).
Diarrhoea and vomiting (D&V): The number of beds closed due to D&V and norovirus has increased this week, with an average of 696 closed per day. This is up from 626 last week and also up from the same week last year (432).
Discharges: There were an average of 23,088 patients each day who no longer met the criteria to reside, a decrease of 0.7% (156 less) compared to last week. Of these, over half (55.1%,12,728) remained in hospital, a smaller proportion than the week prior (55.7%).
Flu: This week the average number of general and acute beds occupied by flu patients each day increased by 61% to 618. An average of 30 critical care beds were occupied by flu patients each day this week (68%, or 12 more than the week before).
General and acute (G&A) beds: There were an average of 101,199 G&A beds open each day across all acute trusts. On average each day, 106 G&A beds were unavailable and void to non-Covid admissions. Average bed occupancy remains at a similar level to last week at 94.9%.
Long stay: The number of patients staying in hospital longer than seven days has increased since last week (+0.7%), but those staying longer than 14 and 21 days has fallen by 0.4% and 0.7% respectively.
Neonatal intensive care beds: For all trusts, bed occupancy has increased from last week and is at 71.1%; this is up from 70.0% last week. The average number of care beds open is at 1,729, 1% higher than last week.
Paediatric intensive care beds: For all trusts, bed occupancy has decreased this week to 83.6%, down from 85.5% last week. The average number of care beds open has fallen this week to 362, down by 0.3%. The average number of care beds available has risen to 60 (seven more than last week).
Staff absences: There were an average of 49,776 total absences each day this week, of which 5% were Covid-19 related (2,358). The total number of staff absences has increased from the week before, and the proportion of Covid-19 related absences has also increased from 4%.