Lord Ouseley – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Ouseley on 2016-09-05.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is the cost of bed-blocking in NHS hospitals in each of the past three years and what plans they have to invest in social care services to reduce those costs.

Lord Prior of Brampton

To date, the Department has made no formal estimate of the costs of delayed discharge to the National Health Service. However, the Department and NHS Improvement are working together to implement Lord Carter’s recommendations on hospital productivity. As part of this, the two organisations are working with providers to develop a richer dataset around all aspects of the patient pathway, including estimates of the cost of delayed discharge.

At the same time, the Department continues to work closely with the NHS and local government to help local areas improve transfers out of hospital, share best practice, and reduce unnecessary delays. We are funding the NHS’s own plan for the future with £10 billion and we are giving local authorities access to up to £3.5 billion of new support for adult social care by 2019/20.

Since April 2015, the Government’s £5.3 billion Better Care Fund has provided much needed investment in better integrated care through locally developed plans and by putting resources where the local NHS and social services think they are needed. Alongside this we are working with local areas to improve the transfer of patients back into the communities.

In 2016-17, there is a new Better Care Fund requirement on local areas to develop a clear, focused action plan for managing delays, including locally agreed targets. The requirement is designed to reduce delays across the health and care system.