Nearly half of patients seeking A&E care at Royal United Hospitals Bath waited longer than four hours to be dealt with last month, figures show.

NHS guidance states that 95% of patients attending accident and emergency departments should be admitted to hospital, transferred elsewhere or discharged within four hours.

But Royal United Hospitals Bath NHS Foundation Trust fell well behind that target in November, when just 54% of the 8,121 attendances at type 1 A&E departments were dealt with within four hours, according to figures from NHS England.

Type 1 departments are those which provide major emergency services – with full resuscitation equipment and 24-hour consultant-led care – and account for the majority of attendances nationally.

It means 46% of patients attending major A&E at Royal United Hospitals Bath waited longer than four hours to be seen last month, compared to 49% in October, and 42% in November 2021.

At Royal United Hospitals Bath NHS Foundation Trust:

In November:

  • 689 patients waited longer than four hours for treatment following a decision to admit – 8% of patients
  • Of those, one was delayed by more than 12 hours

Separate NHS Digital data reveals that in October:

  • The median time to treatment was 122 minutes. The median average is used to ensure figures are not skewed by particularly long or short waiting times
  • Around 8% of patients left before being treated