WAITING times in Ipswich Hospital's Accident and Emergency department are today at their lowest ever level, one of its top bosses said.In the last five weeks the hospital has continually hit the target of seeing 98per cent of patients within four hours of their arrival at A&E.
WAITING times in Ipswich Hospital's Accident and Emergency department are today at their lowest ever level, one of its top bosses said.
In the last five weeks the hospital has continually hit the target of seeing 98per cent of patients within four hours of their arrival at A&E.
And the average figures for April, May and June also show the targets being met.
In a report to the hospital's board, Chris Dooley, the former acting chief executive, outlines the success.
He says: “The trust achieved the 98pc standard in Accident and Emergency in the first quarter of the new financial year.
“Although missing the standard in the early weeks, we recovered the position in the later period and last week was our fifth consecutive week of delivering the standard.
“Our performance nationally has been transformed - in the last four week period we were ranked as 46th out of 155 hospital trusts.”
The target has not been an easy one for the trust to achieve.
Despite a number of measures being taken to reduce the numbers of people coming through the department, including the opening of a £1.2m Acute Medical Unit in November, they have continually struggled to meet the demands.
More people are coming through the doors of A&E than ever before and the hospital also had to contend with fewer beds while wards were shut for refurbishment.
In March the number of people being seen within four hours sunk to just 93pc and senior staff at the hospital were called to an emergency meeting at the Department of Health where they were ordered to turn things around.
One of the problems the hospital had was that they only had one consultant on hand in the Acute Medical Unit but two new consultants, Dr Monica Bose and Dr Robert Mallison, have recently been recruited to assist lead clinician Dr Nicky Trepte.
What do you think about A&E waiting times? Write to Your Letters, Evening Star, 30 Lower Brook Street, Ipswich, IP4 1AN or send us an e-mail to eveningstarletters@eveningstar.co.uk
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