HUNDREDS of patients were forced to wait in ambulances for more than an hour before being seen by staff in Essex hospitals, according to recently published statistics.

The East Suffolk and North Essex NHS Foundation Trust (ESNEFT) is seeing an increase in the number of patients they are treating which, according to the deputy chief executive of the trust Neill Moloney, is having a “huge impact” on emergency departments.

But although the NHS has targeted a maximum waiting time of 30 minutes for ambulance handovers, 228 patients waited in an ambulance for at least one hour when they arrived at ESNEFT A&E wards in week up to Sunday, December 4.

A further 195 patients were forced to wait between 30 minutes and one hour in ambulances.

In total, it means 423 (more than 50 per cent) of last week’s 841 total ambulance arrivals at ESNEFT hospitals were delayed by half an hour or more.

This proportion is well above the national average for last week, when only 15 per cent of patients UK-wide had to wait longer than an hour to be seen by hospital staff.

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The government has responded by ploughing in £500 million into accelerating hospital discharges and increasing the number of NHS call handlers.

But an analyst at the King’s Fund, a health charity, said the NHS is still playing catch-up following the coronavirus pandemic in 2020 and last year.

Danielle Jefferies said: “Problems at the hospital front door are indicative of issues at the back door.

“People are being stranded in hospital because of a long-term lack of investment in social care and NHS community services.”

But ESNEFT’s Neill Moloney said changes are being put in place shorten the waits.

He said: “We are working closely with our partners across the NHS to help crews get back on the road more quickly, and have recently introduced cohorting bays where patients brought to hospital by ambulance can be carefully monitored.

“A rapid release system is also in place, which frees up crews waiting at hospital when there are high priority calls in the community awaiting a response.”