A Renfrewshire-based MSP has urged the health secretary to “get a grip of this crisis” or stand down after new statistics show A&E waiting times continue to hit new lows.
Figures published by Public Health Scotland (PHS) show just 61.9 per cent of people attending accident and emergency (A&E) departments in the week up to Sunday, November 27 were seen and subsequently admitted or discharged within four hours.
The figure dropped from 63.1 per cent the week before.
At the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Paisley, just over half of patients – 54.3 per cent – were seen inside four hours, according to the statistics.
A total of 167 patients waited over eight hours and 41 patients waited more than 12 hours.
The Scottish Government aims for 95 per cent of people to be seen within the four-hour time limit.
As a result, West Scotland Labour MSP Neil Bibby insists health minister Humza Yousaf must sort it out or quit.
Of the 24,995 people who attended A&E in the week up to November 27, some 1,226 waited longer than 12 hours, while 3,363 waited more than eight hours.
A total of 9,532 attendees were waiting longer than four hours, the figures showed.
Meanwhile, October was the worst monthly performance on record when 67.6 per cent were seen within the target time.
Mr Bibby said: “Things are going from bad to worse in our hospitals – and before the usual winter pressures even reach their peak. At national level, October was the worst monthly performance on record in our A&E departments.
“Locally, the latest figures show over 45 per cent of patients waiting more than four hours at RAH A&E. Greater Glasgow and Clyde health board is reporting the worst A&E performance since records began.
“Heroic NHS staff work incredibly hard – they do their utmost for their patients, and we owe them a huge debt of gratitude.
“But the constraints they are being asked to work under are intolerable. They need to be listened to and properly supported by the Scottish Government and health board managers.
“The RAH needs more beds and it needs more staff. Health secretary Humza Yousaf needs at last to get a grip of this crisis – or accept he cannot and step aside.”
The latest statistics have painted a worrying picture for the months ahead, according to the Royal College of Nursing Scotland (RCN).
Data from PHS shows the number of beds occupied by people who no longer require acute hospital care are at the highest level since 2016 with almost 1,900 people waiting to be discharged from hospital.
This lack of available beds in acute hospitals is having a significant impact on emergency departments and A&E performance continues to deteriorate.
The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) state that the nursing workforce crisis is at the heart of the problems facing Scotland’s health and social care services this winter.
Figures published by the Care Inspectorate and Scottish Social Services Council in November showed that 60 per cent of care services that employ nurses reported vacancies. The rate of whole-time equivalent nursing vacancies for these services was 16.2 per cent.
RCN Scotland director Colin Poolman said: “We simply don’t have the nursing workforce we need, and it is patients and families who are suffering.
“Our previous warnings have not been listened to. We must do more to value and retain our existing experienced nursing workforce and to attract the workforce of the future – fair pay is a fundamental part of this.”
Health secretary Yousaf told our sister paper, the Daily Record, he would leave “no stone unturned” in a bid to avoid a winter crisis.
He added: “I spend every waking moment trying to resolve the issues of the health service.”
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