Breaches of standards shows need for Urgent Care Centre to relieve pressure - Farron

Data released this week shows that last month the Morecambe Bay NHS Foundation Trust breached NHS standards about mixed-sex patient accommodation by four times the national rate. Local MP Tim Farron has repeated his call for an Urgent Care Centre at Kendal to help relieve the pressure on other hospitals in the Bay.

The data released yesterday by the NHS shows that the Morecambe Bay NHS Foundation Trust, which runs the Royal Lancaster Infirmary and Furness General Hospital, breached the NHS' own standards 18 times. Of these, 10 were at the Royal Lancaster Infirmary and 8 were at the Furness General Hospital.

This gave the Trust a breach rate of 2 per 1000 patients - four times higher than the national average of 0.5.

Tim said: "These figures provide further proof of the pressure that our local hospitals are under. Patients are having to stay in mixed-sex accommodation because the hospitals are operating at capacity and as winter has set in, the hospitals have had to do their best to look after patients.

"The single biggest thing we could do to relieve the pressure on these hospitals is to set up a 24hr Urgent Care Centre at Westmorland General Hospital in Kendal. This would mean that more serious cases could be seen in Kendal, leading to shorter journey times for patients across the South Lakes. It would also relieve the pressure on the full A&E units at Lancaster and Barrow, and enable ambulances to get back out more quickly."