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700 ambulances left waiting outside West Midlands A&Es

More than 700 ambulances carrying patients were left queuing outside hospitals in the West Midlands for at least half an hour in a single week last month.

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The latest figures shed new light on the crisis at A&Es and show hospitals are struggling to cope with rocketing admissions.

There were 739 handovers that took more than 30 minutes from February 16 to 22 - and that was up from 674 the week before.

It comes just days after it emerged ambulances spent the equivalent of more than a year waiting outside A&Es in four weeks during December and January.

From December 15 and January 11 ambulances waited for a total of 411 days across the West Midlands Ambulance Service area.

And more than a month later the problem is worse than ever.

There were 114 occasions in that one week in February when ambulances waited more than half an hour at the University Hospital North Midlands Trust, which runs the County Hospital in Stafford - that was up from 88 the week before.

There were 70 at Sandwell & West Birmingham NHS Trust, responsible for Sandwell Hospital and City Hospital in Winson Green, an increase from 41 the previous week.

Walsall Manor Hospital had 55, compared to 56 the week before, with 51 at Russells Hall in Dudley - down from 60 - and 32 at Wolverhampton's New Cross Hospital, which was the same as the previous seven days.

The University Hospitals Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust had 99, up from 88, while there were 151 at Heart of England NHS Foundation Trust, compared to 134 the week before.

Worcestershire saw a slight drop from 176 to 167.

Helen Lingham, chief operating officer at UHNM, said: "Like many other trusts across the country, we continue to experience high demand for our A&E services and we have put in place additional measures over the winter months to ensure people are seen as soon as possible.

"Ambulance handover delays can happen when the department is extremely busy and, although the number of delays we experience is comparable with other trusts across the country, we are working closely with our partners to ensure these are prevented wherever possible. Of the delays we experienced during that week, only one took place at County Hospital, who continue to improve waiting times for patients and achieve the 95 per cent standard for patients to be seen within four hours the majority of the time.

"We have also seen improvements at Royal Stoke University Hospital and our work continues to ensure we reduce the longest waiting times."

Paula Clarke, chief executive of the Dudley Group NHS Foundation Trust, said: "We are committed to ensuring patients who arrive by ambulance at our Emergency Department are transferred as quickly and efficiently as possible and always try to avoid delays where possible.

"Some of the ways we have been able to achieve only 51 delays, compared to 87 in the comparable period in the previous year, are working with our dedicated hospital ambulance liaison officer to make sure patients are managed from the point of arrival in a timely manner, working closely with the ambulance authorities on a daily basis to help improve handover times, and closely managing ambulance turnaround times throughout the day at our operational meetings involving key people such as clinical site co-ordinators, matrons, senior managers and our Hospital Ambulance Liaison Officer."

West Midlands Ambulance Service spokeswoman Suzie Wheaton said bosses are regularly working with hospitals to find solutions to the ongoing problem.

A spokesman for NHS England said: "There has been an unprecedented level of demand for all frontline services this winter, which has put every part of the NHS under pressure. We have invested over £48m to give ambulance trusts extra capacity this winter to respond to this pressure."

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