A HOSPITAL trust has breached rules over single-sex wards more than 1,500 times in six months.

The violations by the University Hospitals Sussex NHS Foundation Trust are revealed in new figures by NHS England.

The Patients Association called it an "affront to patients' dignity" and said it was concerned over an increase in breaches nationally.

Rachel Power, chief executive of the charity which campaigns on behalf of patients, said: "The figures for March are of great concern – mixed-sex wards are an affront to patients’ dignity.

"No patient wants to receive intimate, personal care on a mixed-sex ward and it's the sort of stress that doesn't promote recovery."

Hospitals have been expected to eliminate mixed-sex wards, except in justified situations, such as in intensive care, since 2010.

The NHS England figures show that between October and March, the Sussex trust recorded 1,577 breaches of mixed-sex accommodation rules.

This was compared with 517  in the five months between October 2019 and February 2020 – the latest comparable period.

Data was not recorded between March 2020 and September 2021 because of the impact of the coronavirus pandemic.

The single-sex rules apply to sleeping accommodation, which includes any area where patients are admitted on beds or trolleys, even if they do not stay overnight.

Chief Nurse at the trust Maggie Davies said: "The health and safety of our patients is always our number one priority and that includes making sure patients are placed in single-sex accommodation as a priority  

"During the second wave of the pandemic we were seeing more patients than ever before and these intense hospital pressures meant that at times we needed to admit patients on a 'next available' bed basis to ensure that our patients clinical needs were a priority

"As we move out of the pandemic we are constantly looking at ways in which we can improve patient flow. 

“This will ensure that our patients will not have to experience care from within a mixed sex environment and will reduce the number of breaches to a minimum."