THE number of hospital ‘bed days’ lost in Fife has been criticised by Mid Scotland and Fife MSP Alex Rowley.

Mr Rowley has accused Health Secretary Shona Robison of breaking her promise to ‘eradicate delayed discharge’ after official figures were published this week.

He said the figures showed that in August this year, 3,823 days were spent in hospitals across NHS Fife by people delayed in their discharge which was up from 3,476 in July.

Mid Scotland and Fife MSP Alex Rowley condemned the SNP government’s ‘mismanagement’ of the health service and said the situation in Fife was mirrored all over the country. 

“More and more people are being let down by the governments mismanagement of our NHS,” he said. “The NHS is one of our proudest achievements of the 20th century and it must be looked after in the 21st century so it can care for the old when they need it and meet the needs of our communities.

“I have spoken with NHS staff and realise that they are doing the absolute best that they can under immense pressure, however it is clear that many are being overworked, undervalued and not enough resources are being provided.

“The cuts that NHS Fife are being forced to make over the coming years will only make this worse. That’s why Scottish Labour has proposed using the new powers of the Scottish Parliament to stop the cuts to our public services, support our staff and deliver for patients.”

Health Secretary Shona Robison said they were determined to tackle delayed discharge. “That’s why we’re investing £30 million a year, over three years, to accelerate improvements,” she said. “This money has been used to open intermediate care beds, assess people in more appropriate settings and to focus on caring for people at home by investing in home care, new technology and reablement.

“While levels of delayed discharge will fluctuate from month to month, levels of delayed discharge remain consistently below that of last year and we are making progress in reducing the amount of time people are delayed in hospital.

"This stands in stark contrast to the position in England, where there have been recent reports of both delayed discharge rates rising rapidly and concerns about the accuracy of the data.”

“We are continuing our work with health and social care partnerships to tackle this issue and to ensure there are firm plans in place for winter so that there is sufficient hospital capacity to meet local needs.”

A spokesperson for Fife’s Health and Social Care Partnership defended the figures and said that over the last year, their performance has continued to show signs of improvement.

“The total number of bed days lost to patients in delay has reduced from 4,358 in August 2015 to 3,823 in August 2016; this is a reduction of 535 days, representing an improvement of 12 per cent from last year,” said the spokesperson.

“Within this figure, the number of patients in delay who are awaiting home-based or alternative care has seen a more significant drop of 718, while the number of patients with more complex needs has increased by 183 during the same period.

“Beds have been reduced as part of our Re-Shaping Care agenda, which is supporting a move to more community-based care for people who have complex and on-going conditions; this includes greater partnership working with our voluntary sector colleagues to offer alternatives to hospital-based care.”