Corridor Care

Corridor care is when patients are treated in hospitals hallways, waiting rooms or other non-clinical areas due to lack of available beds. Treating patients in this environment makes it harder for colleagues to monitor patients effectively, increases the risk of delays or errors, and creates a stressful, and undignified experience. It undermines both the quality of care and patient trust in our services and not something we want to be happening across our organisation.  

The gesh Board are committed to eliminating corridor care across our Trusts, and work on this is being coordinated across the wider group and system partners.    

Our commitment includes:  

Board-level commitment   and oversight –  the Board are committed to eliminating  corridor care, with transparency, and accountability for improvement, on the understanding it’s  everyone’s responsibility across our hospitals, not just Emergency Departments.

Leadership visibility - with increased support in Emergency Departments, helping frontline teams during periods of operational pressure.

Improving patient flow -   strengthening flow management and discharge with clinical leadership to support faster patient movement through our hospitals and reduce delays 

Working with system partners - across the health and care system to support discharge pathways and improve community capacity.

Urgent and Emergency Care transformation priorities - we have reviewed our existing UEC transformation programme and identified four areas with the most immediate impact:  

• Acute medicine turnaround and rota review 
• Embedding refreshed professional standards 
• Strengthening ward-based processes such as ward rounds and early mobilisation 
• Implementing the Transfer of Care Hub model to improve discharge coordination  

We are continuing to work with colleagues across gesh and with system partners to deliver sustainable improvements in patient flow and patient experience.