Intensive care stretched 'to the limit' because of staff shortages and increase in number of patients needing life-or-death treatment 

  • ICUs are becoming so full that patient safety is increasingly at risk, doctors say
  •  Life-saving operations - including heart and neurosurgery - are being delayed
  • Last week, Hull and East Yorkshire Hospitals ran out of intensive care beds
  • ICU bed shortages have become more acute during the NHS's 'winter crisis' 
  • Patients needing urgent care have had to wait many hours before getting a bed

By DAILY MAIL REPORTER

Published: | Updated:

Intensive care is 'at its limits' due to staff shortages within the NHS and the number of patients needing life-or-death care, senior doctors have warned.

In an unprecedented intervention, the leaders of the specialist doctors who staff the units have warned intensive care units (ICUs) are becoming so full that patient safety is increasingly at risk.

Life-saving operations - including heart, abdominal and neurosurgery - are having to be delayed, they say.

Dr Carl Waldmann, the dean of the Faculty of Intensive Care Medicine (FICM), told The Guardian: 'Intensive care is at its limits in terms of capacity and struggles to maintain adequate staffing levels.

In an unprecedented intervention, the leaders of the specialist doctors who staff the units have warned intensive care units (ICUs) are becoming so full that patient safety is increasingly at risk (file photo)

In an unprecedented intervention, the leaders of the specialist doctors who staff the units have warned intensive care units (ICUs) are becoming so full that patient safety is increasingly at risk (file photo)

'It is important that bed occupancy rates do not exceed 85 per cent in order to ensure there is capacity for emergencies. The reality is that many units are quickly reaching 100% capacity whenever there is excessive hospital activity.'

Just last week, two hospitals in the Hull and East Yorkshire Hospitals NHS trust ran out of intensive care beds and was struggling to provide care many patients needing treatment for life-or-death conditions.

In a letter to its nurses, it said: 'The critical care units have been working under considerable and sustained pressure. 

'This is as a direct consequence of both the high number of patients requiring critical care support, and the intensity of each patient's needs. 

'This is in excess of the established number of level 3 [intensive care] equivalent beds on both hospital sites.'

ICU bed shortages have become even more acute during the NHS's 'winter crisis' and forced patients needing urgent treatment to wait many hours before getting a bed, doctors told the newspaper. 

One said a patient with the blood infection sepsis had to wait more than 12 hours in A&E for an ICU bed to become free. 

NHS

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