Cat Smith – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Cat Smith on 2016-04-26.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, pursuant to the Answer of 26 April 2016 to Question 34277, on disability aids, if he will estimate the cost to the NHS of those delayed days in hospital due to patients waiting for community equipment and adaptions.

Alistair Burt

No estimate has been made of the cost to the National Health Service of delayed days in hospital due to patients waiting for community equipment and adaptions.

The Department collects the unit cost of an excess bed day, which, based on reported costs of stays in hospital beyond statistically derived measures of the expected length of stay for given treatments, was £303 in 2014-15. Whilst this unit cost should generally include only the costs associated with the ward, costing guidance acknowledges that active treatment does continue for some patients. Combining it with information on the number of delayed days would therefore tend to overestimate the gross cost of these delays.