More than half of A&E patients wait longer than four hours at Sussex University Hospitals Trust

More than half of patients seeking A&E care at the Sussex University Hospitals Trust waited longer than four hours to be dealt with last month, figures show.

NHS guidance states that 95% of patients attending accident and emergency departments should be admitted to hospital, transferred elsewhere or discharged within four hours.

But University Hospitals Sussex NHS Foundation Trust fell well behind that target in November, when just 46% of the 20,368 attendances at type 1 A&E departments were dealt with within four hours, according to figures from NHS England.

Type 1 departments are those which provide major emergency services – with full resuscitation equipment and 24-hour consultant-led care – and account for the majority of attendances nationally.

It means 54% of patients attending major A&E at the Sussex University Hospitals Trust waited longer than four hours to be seen last month, in line with 54% in October, and up from 38% in November 2021.

Including the 9,067 attendances at other accident and emergency departments, such as minor A&Es and those with single specialties, 56% of A&E patients were seen by the trust within the target time in November.

At University Hospitals Sussex NHS Foundation Trust:

In November:

There were 1,775 booked appointments, down from 1,894 in October

2,587 patients waited longer than four hours for treatment following a decision to admit – 9% of patients

Of those, 1,010 were delayed by more than 12 hours

Separate NHS Digital data reveals that in October:

The median time to treatment was 225 minutes. The median average is used to ensure figures are not skewed by particularly long or short waiting times

Around 11% of patients left before being treated