A manager of Nottingham’s Queen’s Medical Centre told a committee he ‘did not have an answer’ as to why there was a severe dip in A&E performance at the hospital.
The deputy chief executive of Nottingham University Hospitals Trust (NUH), Dr Stephen Fowlie, faced questions on Tuesday from city and county councillors on why the QMC failed to meet national targets over the summer.
In June, July and August the hospital’s A&E department was more than 20 per cent below the Government’s 95 per cent benchmark of all patients treated or discharged within four hours.
Dr Fowlie addressed a health scrutiny committee meeting at County Hall in West Bridgford.
He said: “We did wonder ourselves why last summer was so busy and we don’t have an answer.
“We have models we use to try and predict attendances and it’s fair to say they are reliable to an extent but they didn’t predict June would be quite as busy as it was.
“Our emergency department is smaller in terms of square metres than other emergency departments and that may be a significant factor.”
We do have things that need to be better
The figure rose from August to September, with around 80 per cent of people visiting the emergency department seen within the four hour target.
Dr Fowlie said: “The decline has been arrested and reversed; the new figures now show that we are within reaching distance of our peers but we do still have some way to travel.
“We do have things that need to be better; our trajectory will improve steadily rather than a jump.
“Our patient experience scores remain strong, including over the Summer period.
“We have recruited a large number of nursing staff particularly in the emergency department and our vacancies are down.”
Some members of the committee expressed concern at the unexplained drop in performance.
Bulwell Labour councillor Ginny Klein said: “I had an 11-hour wait in June; the staff were very pressured and I was given an intelligence test at two in the morning.”
Sherwood Labour councillor Brian Parbutt said: “It’s not very good and not really acceptable is it?
“My concern is that I don’t really understand what has happened; we don’t know why the June dip happened.
“That didn’t happen anywhere else; performance goes up everywhere else.”
Cotgrave Conservative councillor Richard Butler added: “I would love to know what happened in the summer.”
People have taken to social media to share their experiences of visiting the A&E department at QMC in response to the figures.
The merger between NUH and Sherwood Forest Hospitals NHS Trust, which runs King’s Mill and Mansfield Community Hospital, was called off earlier this month because each Trust needs to focus on improving different areas.
Just before that was announced hospital bosses said they were ‘seriously concerned’ about cleanliness levels at QMC and City Hospital after photographs emerged in the summer showing a build-up of dirty dinner dishes on wards and grimy surfaces – the trust is reviewing its deal with private contractor Carillion as a result.
