Nottingham care system ready for winter pressures - council

Due to a lack of home care, some people get stuck in hospital or in 'interim' beds

Health and care bosses in Nottingham have said they are in a strong position to cope with added winter pressures.

A repeat problem is those who have been treated being unable leave hospital as care services are not available.

At one point last year more than 170 people were waiting for social care, with 40 already in "interim beds".

The council said a combination of care worker retention, a new transfer of care hub and more care providers meant the current number was just 10.

High admissions

Demand on the NHS tends to grow in the winter as older and more vulnerable people are more likely to fall seriously ill with conditions such as flu, Covid, and other respiratory problems.

The city council's health and adult social care committee said it had worked with the NHS to better handle anticipated pressures, the Local Democracy Reporting Service said.

Richard Groves, head of service for access and prevention, said this time last year, the service was using 40 interim beds from Nottingham City Homes for patients who could not be transferred from hospital to home straight away.

At the moment, he said, only 10 interim beds were being used, despite continued high hospital admissions.

Faster turnaround

Mr Groves said: "We are in a very positive position going into winter this year. We have seen significant improvements in terms of discharge and social care enablement.

"We were seeing significant waits for that service with 177 people waiting in September 2022.

"The numbers have remained in single figures now since March this year."

"That's attributed to work we've done around discharge through the Better Care Fund to increase capacity within the homecare market," he said.

He added the service is part of the Transfer of Care Hub which was originally piloted last year.

It enables "most" people to be transferred from hospital to a home setting within 24 hours.

Gemma Whysall, system delivery director urgent care for the Integrated Care Board, said a "system control centre" had been established ahead of this winter.

"We are trying to look at live data all the time to make sure we are matching demand and capacity across the health and care system," she said.