Almost one in seven hospital beds were occupied last week by patients who were medically fit to be released, but who were forced to wait for care packages to be put in place.
New data from NHS England shows that more hospital beds – more than 97,600 – were occupied last week than at any point so far this winter.
The figures also show that nearly 13,600 hospital beds were taken up by patients who were fit to be discharged.
Commenting on the data, Dr Adrian Boyle, president of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, told The Times that social care bottlenecks were leaving vulnerable people ‘enduring dangerously long stays’ at A&E departments.
