Lowest proportion of average available hospital beds in Western Trust, new report shows

Of the 6,127.0 average available beds in the North in 2022/23, the Western Trust had the lowest proportion of available beds with 14.8% (907.1) of the total, while 35.7% (2,188.9) were located in the Belfast Trust.

The figures are contained in the Northern Ireland Inpatient Activity Statistics report for 2022/23.

The data show eighteen per cent of inpatients and day case admissions to hospitals in the North last year were in the Western Trust.

In total there were 97,481 admissions in the WHSCT out of a total of 542,079 across the North.

The Western Trust had the second highest throughput in the North with 48.3 admissions per bed. The Southern Trust (49) had the highest while the Belfast Trust had the lowest with 33.6 admissions per bed.

The Western Trust managed the shortest average length of stay with 6.5 days.

Altnagelvin posted the second highest number of cases operated on in the North, accounting for 11,745 cases, just behind the Royal Victoria with 11,887 cases.

There were 86,450 acute admissions in the Western Trust, which accounted for 18.2 per cent of such admissions across the North: 6,130 (7.1%) of these were elective; 26,818 (31%) were non-elective; 30,084 (34.8%) were day case; and 23,418 (27.1%) were regular attenders.

The Western Trust had a day case rate of 83.1% in 2022/23 which was the second lowest of the five HSC Trusts.

In terms of admissions to hospitals for an inpatient or day case procedure with an Independent Sector provider there were 3,770 admissions in the Western Trust in total; 3,054 were day cases; 716 were inpatients.

In 2022/23, 7,058 of admissions to hospital under the maternity and child health programme of care were in the Western Trust.

The Western Trust had the lowest percentage of births with 16.5% (3,349): with 2,219 (10.9%) in Altnagelvin; and 1,130 (5.6%) at the South West Acute.

In 2022/23, 13.3% (2,415) of elderly care admissions were in the Western Trust. This was the lowest percentage recorded in any local health authority in the North.

In 2022/23, 35.0% (1,542) of a total of 4,401 admissions under the Mental Health programme of care were in Western HSC Trust. This was by some way the highest in the North. The second highest was the Northern Trust with 821 admissions.

The Western Trust accounted for 15.2% (6,424) of admissions of children in 2022/23.

For admissions of under 17s, the Western Trust had a day case rate of 72.4% in 2022/23, which was the second lowest of the five HSC Trusts.

The Western Trust accounted for 17.1% (41,218) of admission of older adults in 2022/23.

For admissions of adults aged 65 and over the Western Trust had a day case rate of 84% in 2022/23, which was the second lowest of the five HSC Trusts.

The figures were published by the Department of Health on Thursday.

1,828 patients at Altnagelvin A&E needed ‘immediate’ or ‘very urgent’ treatment