Number of hospital patients waiting over 12 hours for beds soars by 10,500 per cent in five years
In January to March 2012 there were only 15 cases of NHS patients spending half-a-day on trolleys, but the same three-month period this year saw 1,597 people left waiting
THE number of hospital patients waiting on trolleys for 12 hours-plus has shot up more than 10,500 per cent in just five years.
In January to March 2012 there were only 15 cases in the NHS, but in the same period this year 1,597 people waited half a day for a bed.
That was on top of time they spent in casualty waiting to be seen.
Over the same period waits of more than four hours leapt from 40,022 in 2012 to 177,012 in 2017.
The NHS target is for 95 per cent of patients to be discharged, transferred or admitted for treatment within four hours.
Dr Taj Hassan of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine called for more beds.
Lib Dem health spokesman Norman Lamb said: “The NHS is at breaking point.”
The figures were published in the Health Services Journal.