Hospital patients are dying undiscovered in corridors and pregnant women are miscarrying in side rooms, a ‘harrowing’ report has revealed.
The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) published new findings on the state of the NHS, warning that patients were ‘routinely coming to harm’ because of increasing pressure on staff and lack of vital equipment.
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Professor Nicola Ranger, RCN general secretary and chief executive said: ‘Vulnerable people are being stripped of their dignity and nursing staff are being denied access to vital lifesaving equipment. We can now categorically say patients are dying in this situation.’
The RCN surveyed 5,408 nursing staff working in NHS services across the UK from 18 December 2024 to 11 January 2025. More than nine in ten (90.82%) of those surveyed said patient safety is being compromised.
Nurses reported that patients were having cardiac arrests in corridors and had no access to life-saving cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR). They also said that patients were given drugs, intravenous infusions and, in one case, a blood transfusion in corridors which are ‘cold, noisy and too cramped to allow them to have loved ones present’.
One nurse reported: ‘As a staff nurse of over 10yrs and now a paramedic of 4yrs I have never experienced such a broken system, patients are lying for hours in ambulances where no further care can be provided, we have maxed out on treatment that can be given in pre-hospital yet patients still have to wait many hours for triage. As a nurse it is heartbreaking to provide care in corridors and storage rooms where there is no humanity for anyone involved.’
The report comes as the NHS is under ‘mammoth demand’ amid winter flu pressures, with over 20 hospitals declaring critical incidents. However, the RCN said that the current state of care has become normalised and is not just occurring in the winter months.
Professor Ranger has called for immediate Government action to end corridor care. ‘The revelations from our wards must now become a moment in time. A moment for bold Government action on the NHS which has been neglected for so long. Ministers cannot shirk responsibility and need to recognise that recovering patient care will take new investment, including in building a strong nursing workforce.
‘Health leaders must also commit to publishing the data on exactly how many patients are being cared for in these circumstances. The public deserves to know what is happening to patient safety,’ she said.
Duncan Burton, chief nursing officer for England said that this was one of the ‘toughest winters’ for the health system. He said building an NHS that was fit for the future was a ‘key priority for the NHS and Government and the NHS is continuing to work hard to deliver improvements across urgent and emergency care for patients and our staff’.