UK cardiologist says corridor care label masks NHS emergency department crisis
The gist
A UK cardiologist wrote in The BMJ that the "corridor care" label masks England's emergency department crisis.
Only 74% of 2.4 million emergency patients in England were seen within four hours.
How it unfolded
- 2010 -2015Most London emergency departments met or approached the 95% four-hour target, and 12-hour waits were treated as exceptional events requiring root cause analysis.
- 2025The Royal College of Emergency Medicine estimated 15,860 excess deaths were associated with prolonged emergency department waits in England, compared with 1,657 in 2015.
- 2025 -26England recorded 570,957 waits of more than 12 hours from decision to admit to admission, up 7.2% on the previous year.