Welcome drop in the number of patients facing long waits to be seen at Wigan Infirmary's A&E

It has been a busy few months for the casualty departments run by Wrightington, Wigan and Leigh Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (WWL).

Nearly three in five A&E patients waited more than four hours to see a doctor in January, some were treated on corridors and in waiting areas and staff took part in industrial action.

But new figures released by NHS England show there were signs of improvement at the trust in February.

In Wigan Infirmary’s A&E unit, 47.1 per cent of patients were seen within the four-hour target, up from 42.1 per cent in January.

This rose to 69.4 per cent for the trust overall, up from 65.3 per cent in January.

This was helped by 99.1 per cent of patients being seen on time at Leigh Urgent Treatment Centre, an increase from 98.4 per cent the month before.

Nationally, 70.9 per cent of patients were admitted, transferred or discharged in four hours in February.

The NHS recovery plan sets a target of March 2024 for 76 per cent of patients to be seen within this time.

There were a total of 12,405 emergency attendances at Wigan’s units in February, down from 12,712 in January.

But the number of patients who needed to be admitted to hospital rose slightly, from 2,834 to 2,859.

A total of 1,517 people waited more than four hours for a bed, after the decision to admit was made, and 428 people waited more than 12 hours.

However, this was an improvement from January, when the figures were 1,668 and 512 respectively.

Nationally, 44,417 people had to wait more than 12 hours in February, from a decision to admit to actually being admitted, down from 54,308 in January, which was the second-highest figure on record.

The number waiting at least four hours also fell, from 158,721 in January to 139,458 last month.

Interim chief operating officer Claire Wannell said: “It is pleasing to see that the hard work and dedication from our staff and colleagues across the healthcare system is translating into improvements in our emergency department (A&E). Despite this we continue to experience some pressures.

“Our clinicians will always prioritise those in most urgent need and we apologise to anyone who has experienced a significant wait for care at WWL. We recognise that we still have a long way to go to and we would like to reassure our patients that patient safety is a priority at WWL. With this in mind, we are implementing a number of plans, including our discharge and flow programme, to help us with patient care.

“WWL also hosted its very first Multi-agency Discharge Event (MaDE) earlier in the month with many teams across the health and social care economy joining together to provide a more efficient and effective patient journey for our patients when they present at our hospital for treatment, and to help us to recognise and unblock the delays in helping them to get home. This event also enabled us to capture opportunities to reduce the length of stay within our emergency department."

She urged people to only use A&E for life-threatening illnesses and injuries and seek help elsewhere, such as from a GP or pharmacy, if possible.