Emergency measures in place at Scarborough Hospital

The deputy chief executive of York NHS Foundation Trust has said the situation at Scarborough Hospital was not as bad as it was yesterday but emergency measures were still in place.

Mike Proctor said: "At 7.30am yesterday morning, the starting point caused me some concern because every one of our beds was already full, all our escalation areas that we planned to put up in winter were already open, these were already full of patients and, in addition to that, we had 18 patients in our emergency department that were being cared for on beds but patients that needed to be admitted, that had been admitted, there was no bed for on any of our wards.

"Now that caused us some concern because, once you start turning your emergency department into another ward, very quickly you cannot have an emergency department that's working and functioning properly."

Mr Proctor continued: "It wasn't as bad this morning as it was yesterday morning. There were still patients, the hospital was full and there were still patients in our emergency department waiting for beds."

He added: "We kept all our patients safe and all our patients cared for and I'm really proud of our staff for being able to do that."

The advise to patients is to call NHS 111 or their GP to determine whether they needed to attend A&E departments.

Mr Proctor said waiting times at Scarborough Hospital fell below the national standard, with only around 75% to 80% of patients being seen within four hours.