Daily Insight: Chiefs open up on covid in special podcasts

In two special episodes for the HSJ Health Check podcast, our deputy editor Dave West talks to four CEOs whose trusts have been hit especially hard by covid.

The chiefs from King’s, Croydon, Chester and Sandwell and West Birmingham hospital trusts shared some of the lessons they have learned, including the need for:

• faster decision making;
• resources for deprived and diverse areas, which are often hardest hit;
• the need for basic staff facilities such as parking and eating areas for staff;
• longer-term attention to the wellbeing of staff who were most affected;
• trusts to be given time to recover.

The four trusts are among those to have weathered worst during the pandemic to date, according to HSJ analysis. Three of them had more than a fifth of their beds occupied by covid patients for at least five entire months, between 20 March 2020 and 30 April 2022. 

On elective care, the CEOs highlighted how the length of lists and waits, and the NHS’s ability to keep up, are now much worse in some areas than others. Some of those with the longest waits and lists at present – such as Countess of Chester and Birmingham – were also heavily hit by covid; for others this is not the case.

Highs and lows

The number of patients with covid admitted to hospital rose in the seven days to 7 June, official data suggests. The flipside, however, was a positive one, indicating that the proportion of people being treated “primarily” for the condition dropped to a record low, official data suggests.

The rolling seven-day covid admissions total has been falling consistently for the last two months from 6 April. But the seven-day period until 7 June shows an 11 per cent week-on-week increase, from 3,115 to 3,453.

Admissions were rising in all seven English regions apart from the East.

The South East is by far the biggest driver of growth, showing a 33 per cent increase. The North East and Yorkshire region is the second worst affected, with admissions up 18 per cent.