MORE than one in five patients visiting A&E at Worcestershire Royal Hospital in February waited longer than four hours to be seen, treated and either discharged or admitted, the highest level for more than a year.

The Royal, along with the majority of acute hospitals in the UK, has been under extreme pressure since before Christmas, leading to a raft of problems including lengthening waiting times, an ever-increasing backlog of elective operations and some patients being treated in the corridor during particularly busy times.

Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust – which runs the Royal as well as Kidderminster Hospital and Redditch’s Alexandra Hospital – has consistently failed to meet the NHS’ target of seeing, treating and either admitting or discharging at least 95 per cent of patients visiting A&E within four hours for more than a year. The most recent figures show the target was met in only 69 per cent of cases at the Royal in February, the lowest level for more than a year.

In an effort to ease the pressure a new assessment area is being set up at the hospital, where patients brought to hospital by ambulance and those sent by a GP or other health worker will be assessed and redirected to the most appropriate unit or ward.

They will mean patients with urgent conditions are not left in A&E waiting to be seen, easing the pressure on staff and meaning those patients visiting the department under their own steam are seen more quickly.

The trust's chief executive Penny Venables said the new area would mean patients suffering from time-sensitive problems such as a heart attack could be seen by specialists as soon as possible.

“What we need to do is create this assessment area with our surgical and medical colleagues so, instead of going to A&E and waiting on a trolley, ambulances can bypass A&E and go straight to the right unit,” she said.

“We have had that in the past but because of what happened in the winter we had to change it into wards.

“But that’s only compounding the problem.

“This is about saving lives. If you’re having a stroke or a heart attack you need to be on a specialist ward as soon as possible.”

Mrs Venables added this is not connected to the long-running project revamping hospital care in the county.

Although the project was originally planned to be complete by the end of 2014, it has been beset by delays. An independent review into the scheme was carried out at the start of this year by the West Midlands Clinical Senate, but last week it was announced the results of this would now not be published until after next month’s General Election, meaning a public consultation will not be launched until May at the earliest.

Last week the trust announced the amount of cubicles in the Royal’s A&E department was to be increased from 18 to 30 in a bid to meet levels of demand.