More patients seen in four hours at Shropshire's A&Es

Latest NHS England figures show 90.1 per cent of patients, who go through the doors of the two hospitals run by Shrewsbury and Telford Hospitals NHS Trust, were seen within the Government's target time during the week up to Sunday, March 8.

It is an increase on the previous week's figure of 87.9 per cent but still below the national target of 95 per cent of patients to be seen, treated, admitted or discharged within four hours.

It is the 24th week in a row the Trust has missed that gold standard at its two acute hospitals in the county - the Princess Royal Hospital in Telford and the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital in Shrewsbury.

The figure remains higher than some of the numbers achieved since the Christmas and new year period when A&E unites were stretched to the limit.

The number is also higher than the England average for the week to March 8, of 89 per cent.

Shropshire's two A&Es saw 2,152 people through the doors last week, according to the latest figures available.

The number is up by 16 on the week before. Of those people, 450 were admitted to hospital.

The 90.1 per cent equates to 214 people waiting longer than the four hour gold standard to be seen at the units. That figure is down by 44 on the previous week and below the England average of 220.

The national percentage figure, according to the new statistics is 89 per cent - up two percentage points on the week before.

There are currently just 31 hospital trusts in the country meeting the 95 per cent target, with 109 major A&E trusts missing it, including Shrewsbury and Telford NHS Trust.

Nationally, it is the 23rd week in succession that the goal of 95 per cent has been missed.

In Shropshire, just eight planned operations were cancelled, down by two from the week before and below the national average of nine.

The number of ambulances "queuing" outside the hospital - those waiting at least half an hour to transfer a patient into the care of hospital staff - was also down on the week before by 16 to 27.

There was also a decrease in the number of delayed discharges in the county in the week leading up to Sunday, March 9 - where a hospital is unable to release a patient despite their treatment being completed because of a lack of support available in the community.

In Shropshire the number was down by seven to 240.

The number of beds at the county's A&Es unavailable during the week due to diarrhoea and vomiting or norovirus-like symptoms remained at zero.