A SHORTAGE of care beds and home support services for elderly and frail patients being discharged from hospital is putting extra pressure on the NHS.

A report to West Sussex County Council’s health and adult social care committee tomorrow highlights work being done to tackle the problem of bed-blocking patients in already under-pressure hospitals.

The aim is to cut down on the number of people ready to be discharged who are having to stay in hospital because no care place is available, or a package of support cannot be arranged.

Hospitals across Sussex came under intense pressure during December and January, at times operating at the highest level of alert.

A shortage of available beds led to long waits in accident and emergency departments and in some cases led to non-urgent operations being cancelled.

The report says Sussex Community NHS Trust had been providing extra support for people if nothing was available in the social care market.

This helped ensure patients were discharged more quickly from Princess Royal Hospital in Haywards Heath and East Surrey Hospital in Redhill, which cares for people from the north of the county.

However, it meant the trust’s staff were not able to focus as much on other services, such as help for people to prevent them having to go to hospital in the first place or provide rehabilitation for those recently discharged.

The report says the problem was of particular concern in the Mid Sussex area.

It says: “This issue is triggered by the lack of market capacity and home care workforce, leading to an inability to move cases on from community health services and in to a more long-term home care provider service.”

Plans have now been developed to increase capacity in the community trust teams to help them support people in their own homes while they wait for a longer-term home care provider to be found.

Work being done to tackle the problems includes a discharge to assess scheme where individuals are admitted into care home placements for up to six weeks before being able to go home.

A Home from Hospital Service helps boost the confidence and physical and mental wellbeing of people who have just been discharged to minimise the risk of them having to be re-admitted.

The committee will be considering whether adequate measures are in place to facilitate the move from hospital to home and whether other issues should be scrutinised.