New £842m Glasgow hospital 'worst' on A&E waiting times

The new £842m hospital began taking patients in April

Scotland's newest hospital is the worst-performing for patient waiting times in the latest weekly accident and emergency (A&E) figures.

They show that the £842m South Glasgow University Hospital saw 1,420 A&E patients in the week ending 31 May.

Of these, 238 waited for longer than the four-hour target for treatment with 20 waiting longer than eight hours.

The 83.2% performance rate is the lowest of Scotland's 31 A&E units and well below the 95% government target.

The 1,109-bed hospital, which began taking patients in April, was built on the site of the Southern General and is one of the largest acute hospitals in the UK.

Merged services

The new campus replaces the Royal Hospital for Sick Kids at Yorkhill, the Southern General Hospital, Western and Victoria infirmaries and Mansionhouse Unit.

NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde had the lowest performance rate for any health board, with 88.5% of patients seen within four hours.

The health board also had the highest number of people attending A&E at 6,670.

The campus has two hospitals - one for adults and a dedicated children's facility

Throughout Scotland, overall performance improved slightly, with a total of 92.6% of people treated within four hours, up from 92% in the previous week.

The figures show 156 patients waited more than eight hours and 21 patients waited more than 12 hours.

Health Secretary Shona Robison said: "Today's figures show that our NHS staff are continuing to work hard towards delivering a first-class service for Scotland.

"This week has seen an improvement in waiting times but weekly publications will continue to show fluctuations in these figures.

"What is important now is that health boards focus on sustaining the reduced waiting times we have recently seen and make more, sustainable progress towards meeting our world-leading targets."

The Scottish government has put in place an action plan to improve unscheduled emergency care and Ms Robison said £100m had been invested to tackle delayed discharges, otherwise known as bed blocking.

'Overwhelmed by demand'

Reacting to the A&E figures, Labour's Jenny Marra said it was clear that the new hospital could not cope with patient numbers.

She added: "We want to see more people treated and supported at home and in the community but the failure to resource GPs and care workers to provide this is driving patients to a hospital which is being overwhelmed by demand.

"Until we see the shift to community care that the SNP government promised, many hospitals across the country will have to ask patients to wait longer and longer for treatment and targets will continue to be missed."