Medway A&E department rated inadequate over concerns for patient safety
Report by ITV News Meridian's Sarah Saunders
A hospital in Kent has been ordered to make immediate improvements to its emergency services.
The Care Quality Commission carried out an inspection of the Medway Maritime Emergency Department in December after reports patients were waiting for hours to be admitted.
The surprise inspection came at a time NHS staff were battling the pandemic.
Inspectors found delays in patients being transferred from an ambulance into the department and poor patient flow, with people experiencing substantial delays before being admitted.
Inspectors described one patient who had been intubated in the department for 24 hours without a decision for onward care.
There were also concerns that patients were not receiving the necessary timely clinical care when needed and that some care records were incomplete.
A warning notice was issued to the trust requiring action to mitigate the risks to patient safety posed by ambulance handover delays and improve patient flow through the emergency department.
Overall the emergency department is now rated as inadequate, with the department rated as good for being effective and caring but inadequate when it came to being safe, responsive to people's needs and well-led, the CQC said.
Medway NHS Foundation Trust says following the report, it immediately took steps to address concerns raised, including measures to reduce waiting times.
Chief Executive James Devine, said: "We have taken a number of steps since the CQC's visit to address the findings from their inspection, including taking immediate action to improve the way we manage pressures within our Emergency Department.
"We have implemented an improvement plan to ensure we are consistently providing safe, high quality patient care, which is already making a positive difference to patients' care.
"Actions we have put in place include working with health partners to reduce the number of patients waiting in ambulances, introducing processes to quickly identify and prioritise patients who deteriorate in ambulances, and opening more beds so that patients don't wait so long to be admitted."