Time to Act: Urgent Care and A&E - the patient perspective

Time to Act: Urgent Care and A&E - the patient perspective The Royal College of Emergency Medicine and the Patients Association today release their joint report, Time to Act – Urgent Care and A&E: the Patient Perspective.

The report is released following a survey of patients between September 2014 and February 2015 in relation to the choices, decisions and experiences of patients who accessed A&E services for urgent healthcare needs.

Findings of the survey include:

• Patients are aware of alternatives to A&E, but many still attend A&E because they are unable to access help elsewhere
• Substantial numbers of patients attend A&E because they are advised to do so by other healthcare providers 

These findings demonstrate that the NHS not only needs to ensure that patients are fully informed of services such as out-of-hours GPs, walk-in centres and the NHS 111 service, but must also ensure that these services have sufficient capacity and are available when required. Unless this issue is addressed, we will continue to see more pressure on an already overstretched A&E system.

• Press release
• Full report

See also:

• RCGP response to RCEM and Patients Association report on urgent care Royal College of General Practitioners