North West hospitals at 'winter crisis levels'
It comes after A&E departments have warned of a recent surge in patients
The head of the Royal College of Nursing for the North West is warning NHS staff are on the brink of collapse before we've even hit winter.
it comes after Alder Hey told parents last week that they and their children would be turned away from A&E unless it's a life threatening emergency, saying they're under incredible pressure from the demand.
The North West Ambulance service also urged people to contact them only if it's a real emergency after people dialed 999 for things like sunburn and a cut toe.
Estephanie Dunn, Regional Director for the Royal College of Nursing in the North West said:
"We've got what looks like winter...lots of bottlenecks of ambulances queueing outside hospitals, insufficient numbers of beds to be able to put people into to move them from the A&E department and not enough staff to deliver the safe care that these people, our patients, deserve.
"For this to be happening in July is really unprecedented for us. We've got staff who have worked extra days so there isn't an awful lot left in the tank for them and this is just something that they cannot see their way through at the moment."
Estephanie said the pandemic has exacerbated an ongoing staffing crisis with a shortage of 5000 registered nurses in the region:
"We need to have the right numbers of people with the right skills in the right place so people aren't having to go to work and think do you know what I had to nurse somebody in the corridor today and that's not great, I could of, should of done better for them, but because the system is so log jammed they're not able to because they haven't got enough staff...that is really distressing.
"I seriously struggle with how our members will be able to keep going because it's physically impossible for them at the moment. Covid isn't going away any time soon."