Extra beds needed to see hospitals through winter

Hospital staff in Shropshire are bracing themselves for winter

A hospital trust says it will need up to 63 additional beds to help it deal with predicted extra demand over the winter months.

The details are included in a report looking at how The Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust (SATH) is preparing for the traditionally busy period between November and March.

It shows last year's plan was "insufficiently robust" and had a "limited positive impact", with patients experiencing long delays in A&E, and December being the worst month for ambulance handovers on record.

Despite that, the report claims the trust "coped considerably better than previously, and compared to the rest of the [West Midlands] region".

Bed capacity has been an ongoing issue for SATH, with the latest figures showing that, in July, 1,407 people waited more than 12 hours on a trolley in A&E, the highest figure since November 2024.

The Trust has already announced rehabilitation and recovery units in the Princess Royal (PRH) and Royal Shrewsbury (RSH) hospitals will shut to make way for two new wards to help relieve the pressure.

Managers have also taken steps to tackle staff sickness rates, having launched a campaign to increase flu vaccination rates to 60%.

Tests for respiratory viruses are to be made available in the A&E departments at both the RSH and the PRH, and "high-risk" areas will be deep cleaned to reduce the risk of infection.

The recent government league tables, which rated the performance of NHS trusts based on factors such as operation and A&E waiting times, ranked SATH 113th out of 134.