Published 15 January 2009, doi:10.1136/bmj.b156
Cite this as: BMJ 2009;338:b156

News

Emergency patients in England wait longer to be seen

Andrew Cole

1 London

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

More than a quarter of patients who attend emergency departments (A&E) in England say that they have to wait longer than the government’s four hour limit, and 14% are receiving no pain relief, according to the Healthcare Commission’s annual survey.

The survey, conducted last year in 151 trusts and involving nearly 50 000 people, shows that despite more pressure on emergency services most patients (88%) are satisfied with their care.

But it also shows that more people are waiting longer to be seen. Fewer patients were seen by a doctor or nurse within 15 minutes (40%) or examined within an hour (73%) than in the commission’s surveys in 2003 and 2004.

Although 98% of patients were seen within four hours, 27% said that their entire visit lasted longer than four hours, more than in the previous survey. The commission says that this may be because a growing number of departments . . . [Full text of this article]


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