"Accident and emergency"

Thanks for your feedback. The message you mention relates to the national target hospitals are set for emergency treatment. It doesn't mean that patients wait four hours to be seen. It means that at least 95% of patients attending the Emergency Department should should have been seen, treated and either discharged home or admitted to hospital within four hours of arriving. Patients are assessed on arrival at the Emergency Department and then triaged so they receive appropriate care. They are treated in order of clinical need and arrival time. Many of our patients have been seen, treated and discharged in much less than four hours.

In recent months, like many hospitals we have been caring for much higher numbers of patients in our Emergency Departments. Many of these patients have been very unwell and they have needed to be admitted to hospital and this has meant that, unfortunately, we haven't always been able to achieve the target for treating 95% within four hours of arrival. However, we expect to be on track again in the next couple of months as better weather arrives and we have more beds in the hospital.

We hope that explains a bit more about the four-hour target and the time patients wait to be seen, assessed and treated. We are working to reduce waiting times for all emergency patients so that they are as short as possible.

Thanks for your feedback. The message you mention relates to the national target hospitals are set for emergency treatment. It doesn't mean that patients wait four hours to be seen. It means that at least 95% of patients attending the Emergency Department should should have been seen, treated and either discharged home or admitted to hospital within four hours of arriving. Patients are assessed on arrival at the Emergency Department and then triaged so they receive appropriate care. They are treated in order of clinical need and arrival time. Many of our patients have been seen, treated and discharged in much less than four hours. In recent months, like many hospitals we have been caring for much higher numbers of patients in our Emergency Departments. Many of these patients have been very unwell and they have needed to be admitted to hospital and this has meant that, unfortunately, we haven't always been able to achieve the target for treating 95% within four hours of arrival. However, we expect to be on track again in the next couple of months as better weather arrives and we have more beds in the hospital. We hope that explains a bit more about the four-hour target and the time patients wait to be seen, assessed and treated.