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The Royal College of Nursing is calling for corridor care to be eradicated following a new report which highlights the scale of the issue and its impact on patients.
The report, Corridor Care: unsafe, undignified, unacceptable, says corridor care is ‘a symptom of a system in crisis’, with patient demand in all settings outstripping workforce supply. The result is patients left unable to access care near their homes and instead being forced to turn to hospitals.
Corridor care leaving patients without access to life saving equipment
The report includes a survey of almost 11,000 frontline nursing staff across the UK. The survey found that more than one in three (37%) nursing staff working in a typical hospital setting reported delivering care in an inappropriate area, such as a corridor, during their most recent shift.
Nursing staff frequently reported their concern for how corridor care was impacting patients, with 67% saying corridor care compromised patients’ privacy and dignity and 53% saying it leaves patients without access to vital equipment such as oxygen, suction and monitoring.
Others cited concerns that emergency call buttons are unavailable, infection prevention controls are compromised, health and safety regulations are breached and medication cannot be stored safely.
The nursing union is now calling for mandatory national reporting of patients being cared for in corridors to ensure that corridor care becomes a ‘Never Event’ in NHS services.
Government urged to report publicly on corridor care
Speaking at the RCN’s annual conference, Acting General Secretary and Chief Executive Professor Nicola Ranger said corridor care is a “national emergency”.
“This is a tragedy for our profession. Our once world-leading services are treating patients in car parks and store cupboards. The elderly are languishing on chairs for hours on end and patients are dying in corridors. The horror of this situation cannot be understated. It is a national emergency for patient safety and today we are raising the alarm.”
“This is about honesty and accountability. Care being delivered in front of a fire exit isn’t care. Signing do not resuscitate orders in a corridor isn’t care. Receiving a cancer diagnosis in a public area isn’t care. It’s a nightmare for all involved. We need to call it out as nursing staff, and health leaders and ministers need to take responsibility.”
The report makes several recommendations for the government and health leaders. This includes:
- The UK government should provide additional funding and investment in health and care services to ensure the NHS moves to a more sustainable model that is not ‘perpetual crisis management’
- Health and care ministers across the UK must be responsible for reporting publicly on the instances of corridor care each quarter, along with the actions underway to reduce occurrences
- The government must boost nursing supply and address retention issues, and create additional clinical spaces and increase staffed bed capacity.
The RCN says the public and patients are in a ‘unique position’ to be able to force decision makers to take action on eradicating corridor care, and they call on patients and their families to raise complaints and concerns when corridor care occurs.
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