Bid to reduce 'bed-blocking'

Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust revealed last week that more than 60 patients no longer needing hospital treatment are "blocking" hospital beds at any one time.

Some are waiting for assessment of their home care needs and others are waiting for places in nursing or residential homes, they say.

But a nursing home owner says he believes lack of funds is the real reason for delays in transferring patients into private nursing care.

Eddie Clarke, who is head of health and social care, said one idea for reducing bed blocking was for a rapid response team to provide short-term home care when patients did not need to be admitted.

Charges for rehabilitation places in local authority and private residential homes should also be waived, to encourage patients to take them.

"We also feel that some people are going into nursing homes prematurely and that we could support more people in their own homes," said Mr Clarke.

Fifteen to 20 bed-blockers in any week might be waiting for nursing home or residential places, particularly in the Evesham and Pershore area, where there were only two nursing homes, said Mr Clarke.

"In some cases it may be that the homes are asking for a fee higher than our standard £383 per week, which is 6.9 per cent more than last year," he said.

Richard White, of Stanfield Nursing Home at Rushwick, said owners were bemused by claims that there was a shortage of nursing home beds.

"We estimate there are 120 empty beds across the county. Three beds in an Evesham nursing home have been empty for the last five weeks and there are several more empty beds at both Pershore and Broadway," he said.

"A nursing home in Badsey had to close down for lack of patients."

"It's as though the social workers have all gone very quiet, which in our previous experience indicates that they have run out of money to fund beds," he said.

"They delay making an assessment until they have got the money to meet the need."

Without this year's increase, more nursing homes would have gone out of business, he said.

A realistic fee recommended by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation was £470 per week.

Mr Clarke agreed some homes were dissatisfied with the level of fees, but he said it was "absolutely not true" that anyone was waiting in a hospital bed for lack of social services funding.

Health Secretary Alan Milburn has since announced pensioners will be given one-off payments to help them live at home.

The money would pay for extra nursing care or adaptations to their homes, reducing bed-blocking by enabling pensioners to leave hospital.

Worcestershire County Council was unable to comment on the scheme, saying no formal notification had been received from the Government and the detail had yet to be confirmed.