A unified definition on corridor care is an interesting approach – but only if meaningful action follows.

That’s the response by the Royal College of Emergency Medicine after NHS England published a national definition of corridor care, providing a framework to collect and analyse data on the scale of the practice across the country.

It was published alongside a letter, sent out to the healthcare system today (4 March).

Signed by Sarah-Jane Marsh, NHSE National Priority Director for Urgent and Emergency Care, the document was addressed to all Trust CEOs and chairs, as well as regional directors and has been published online.

It outlined NHS England’s strategy for tackling corridor care, and its advice for hospital leaders.

Responding, Dr Ian Higginson, President of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine said: “Corridor care is dangerous, undignified, and a source of national shame.

“It is a symptom of overcrowding in Emergency Departments and is primarily the result of long waits for admission. Eliminating these long waits would eliminate corridor care.

“We absolutely welcome NHS England’s commitment to focus on this issue. We also welcome the intention behind today’s definition on corridor care. This has been promised since early last year.

“However, we can already measure long waits and overcrowding. It remains to be seen whether trying to measure corridor care on top of this will prove more effective.

“We have two main concerns about the complex definition. Firstly, the definition will not include, for instance, patients waiting for admission in areas not designated as being part of the ED, waiting in spaces designed for rapid assessment, or potentially on chairs in waiting rooms.

“These patients may still experience harmful long waits in inappropriate spaces. Secondly, the 45-minute threshold is hard to justify. We are concerned that the definition, as it stands, will encourage manipulation of figures to make things look better than they are. Sadly, we have seen this happen so often we are expecting to see it again.

“It is of course important to measure things in order to drive improvement, but much more important to actually make those improvements. That will only happen if there is a change of both approach and gear around the root causes.

“Renewed encouragement around good leadership and operational practice is timely. It does matter.

“Beyond that, whilst there has been a lot of focus on trying to avoid unnecessary admissions to hospitals, we have still not seen a determined drive to increase the availability of hospital beds for those patients who need them.

“This would be achieved by improving how hospitals work, particularly in the evenings and weekends, by reducing the number of patients who are in hospital who don’t need to be there, and by investing in more staffed beds.

“The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care has stated he will eradicate corridor care by 2029. That would be good news for our patients and staff. The clock is ticking.

“We are ready to contribute to discussions on how this could happen.”