NHS Forth Valley: Discharge plans to be reviewed in bid to send patients home from hospital quicker

First Minister Nicola Sturgeon revealed that all health boards had been ordered to carry out the work as the NHS continues to come under “severe” pressure.

To tackle the problem of delayed discharges, the Scottish Government last week announced an additional £8 million to buy care home beds, in a bid to free up spaces in hospitals.

Latest figures show there were 124 delayed discharges in Forth Valley, the highest figure since last June.

A spokesperson for NHS Forth Valley said they were continuing to work closely with Health and Social Care Partnerships (HSCPs) who are taking forward a range of plans to increase capacity in community-based health and social care services to support hospital discharges. “This includes securing additional care home beds, investing in additional care at home services and increasing community-based rehabilitation services,” they added.

“Local discharge plans are reviewed on a daily basis by multidisciplinary reams, assessing people’s needs and identifying new and alternative ways of meeting those needs to support discharges from local hospitals as timely as possible.

“Staffing and capacity within social care remains a significant challenge to meeting ongoing high demand, which is why work continues at pace in both HSCPs to recruit new colleagues and create additional capacity in a wide range of local social care services.”

While several health boards have already announced plans to pause elective surgery, NHS Forth Valley said it had not taken that step for now but was closely monitoring the situation with regular reviews.