Staffing problems across the Vale of York health system are causing increased harm to patients and leading to care homes being unable to provide nursing care, a meeting of health bosses was told.
“Incredible workforce issues right across the system” mean patients’ needs are not always being met, according to Michelle Carrington, executive director of quality and nursing at the Vale of York Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG).
The Vale of York CCG has member GP practices from York city centre through Hambleton and Ryedale and Selby and Tadcaster.
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“I can’t portray enough what pressures people are under in health and social care everywhere,” she told a meeting of the board of governors.
Board papers show roles in the social care sector are remaining unfilled as recruitment drives are seeing “few or no applicants”.
Ms Carrington said: “In terms of care homes, what we’re seeing is nursing homes choosing to convert to residential because they can’t get the registered nursing staff.
“Then when there are gaps in registered nursing provision in nursing homes it is very fragile and the agencies are stretched. And there are risks to having agency staff, not having that continuity of care and huge gaps in the workforce.
“Sometimes that has led to very urgent and very tenuous discussions about the fragility of whether that home can stay open today – sometimes we get away with it by the skin of our teeth and on occasion we have had to move patients quickly, which is always a very difficult thing to do.”
‘Worrying all round’
Some residents were forced to leave St Catherine’s Care Home in Shipton by Beningbrough in September after the home became unable to continue providing specialist nursing care.
Homes have been asked by North Yorkshire County Council to submit business plans to show how they are mitigating staffing issues.
Ms Carrington added: “We’re seeing elements of the system which don’t traditionally struggle with staffing, really struggling with staffing, and it’s simply not available, however hard people work.
“What we are seeing is increased harm to patients, increased falls, increased pressure ulcers, increased incidents of the impact of delays and, as you will have seen all over the news, huge ambulance waits outside hospitals.
“It is worrying all round. People are trying their absolute best to meet patient need but it isn’t always possible.”
In Scarborough, the Esk ward at the Cross Lane hospital, an adult female mental health ward, has been forced to close for four months due to staffing shortages.
Tees, Esk and Wear Valleys NHS Foundation Trust has said it is “working extremely hard to reopen the ward as soon as possible”.