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Beds taken up by stranded patients are continuing to put the hospital under pressure, with a spate of operations cancelled this week to urgently make room for a surge in emergency admissions.
On Wednesday, there were 36 patients who were “medically fit for discharge” but stuck in hospital because they were waiting for placements in nursing homes or for a residential care package to be put in place.
It's little progress since June, when the hospital was described as being under "unprecedented" strain, when around 50 beds were occupied by patients with nowhere to go.
At the time, the challenges were put down to a shortage of beds and recruitment crisis in the care sector.
Due to the pressing need for more inpatient beds, the hospital was forced to reorganise its wards last month.
Corbière Ward was changed back to inpatient beds and Medical Day Care - the unit responsible for providing intravenous treatment to people with chronic conditions, such as multiple sclerosis – was subsequently "temporarily" relocated from to the physiotherapy department to free up more space.
Health officials said at the time that they hoped to find a longer-term solution by autumn.
Pictured: The Medical Day Care Unit was relocated to the ground floor help free up more space for beds.
Despite the drive for more bed space, the hospital has still been struggling with surges in admissions.
This week, 12 operations had to be called off at short notice to make room.
"Since Friday we have seen higher than predicted demand for emergency medical beds and some surgical specialities. Some of this could be heat related," explained Interim Clinical Services Director Claire Thompson.
One elderly islander was only informed her operation was being rescheduled as she made her way to the hospital, leaving her in significant distress.
A Government spokesperson said that the hospital will usually "leave the decision to cancel to a later stage" because they want to "ensure the amount of cancellations is kept to the absolute minimum".
"We are really sorry if on this occasion we were not responsive or considerate enough in regards to this particular patient," they added.
Pictured: Health apologised for telling one islander her surgery was no longer going ahead as she was on her way to the hospital.
"We want to improve the way we employ a flexible approach around this, understanding that some patients find it easier to have their procedure cancelled the day before while others are happy for that decision to be made on the day with the chance that their procedure could still go ahead depending on bed availability."
Bed management statistics for the summer months are yet to be released.
However, the latest health performance report up to March 2022 shows that the number of hospital stays that had lasted more than seven days were in 'red alert' territory for the first three months of this year.
CLICK TO ENLARGE: The number of lengthy bed stays per month, from March 2021 to March 2022.
Whereas in 2021, lengthy stays peaked at 1,965, they were consistently at more than 2,300 in January, February and March, peaking at 2,631.
Ms Thompson said the hospital hopes to "de-escalate" its current position "by next week".
"We would therefore be expecting a return to orthopaedic inpatient elective work next week. Patients are being rescheduled. It is usual for hospitals to have periods of increased demand," she said.
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