Discharge lounge plans for Cramlington hospital welcomed by Blyth Valley MP

Ian Levy, MP for Blyth Valley, has welcomed news that patients across the North East and Yorkshire are set to benefit from two new ambulance hubs and eight new and upgraded discharge lounges, which will free up A&E beds and help cut urgent and emergency care waiting times.

He said: “I fully support any initiative to reduce waiting times. This new funding of £1,440,000 for an extended discharge lounge at the NSEC Hospital in Cramlington will help free up hospital beds and cut A&E waiting times and is great news for patients.” 

Four of the lounges are already open and a further four lounges are set to open at the Northumbria hospital and three Yorkshire hospitals.

A Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust spokesperson said: “We’re currently working on plans to see how this new funding will enable us to provide some additional capacity at our emergency hospital in Cramlington.

“The current thinking is that some additional temporary space will help us to maintain patient flow and ensure waiting times are reduced as much as possible for those who need our care.”

The new facilities are backed by nearly £50m of investment as part of plans to improve urgent and emergency care performance and cut waiting lists, with the North East and Yorkshire receiving more than £8.4m in funding.

Health and Social Care Secretary Steve Barclay said: “These new ambulance hubs and discharge lounges are another example of how we’re investing to cut waiting times – one of the government’s top five priorities.

"They are already benefiting tens of thousands of patients by freeing up beds and reducing the time for patients waiting to be admitted from A&E.

“The hubs will allow ambulances to manoeuvre more quickly and cut out unnecessary delays, and the lounges will free up hospital beds, while offering patients a more comfortable environment to recover in while they’re waiting to leave hospital. All of this is to ensure that we can bring down waiting times and prepare for next winter.”