Perth has been given extra funding of more than £100,000 to help it cope with the worst “bed blocking” problem in Tayside.
A meeting of the Perth and Kinross Community Health Partnership (CHP) in Murray Royal Hospital heard that the Fair City had 32 delayed discharges in October last year and 37 in October 2013 the highest figure in Tayside.
A report featuring details of the delayed discharges reveals that NHS Tayside received an additional £393,000 in November.
Perth and Kinross’s share is £131,000.
The meeting heard of the continuing pressure on hospital social work teams to assess patients for discharge, with the number of referrals rising from 20 a week in January 2009 to 28 a week by September last year.
The partnership members were told that this “inpatient pressure” is attributable to the continuing rise in the number of people over 75 who are being admitted to hospital on an unplanned basis and are “dominating” admissions lists.
The committee also heard that the average age of patients in that position, whose discharge is delayed as they wait for social care services to be set up, is 82.
In addition, the average number of people waiting for a care plan in Perth and Kinross had risen from 3.4 per week during April 2011-September 2012 to the current average of 5.6 people per week.
The meeting also heard that several methods have been used in a bid to tackle the problem of “bed blocking”.
These include a reablement homecare service, which has been in operation since 2011 in Perth and Kinross.
This service seeks to enable people to regain skills which they have lost as a result of the illness/injury which led to their hospital admission.
As a result, between 355 and 40% of all patients referred to the service require no continuing support after six weeks.
The “front door” model of care also helps to prevent inpatient admission or delayed discharge by ensuring that from the time they arrive at hospital appropriate patients deal with a team which is supported by a geriatrician, pharmacist and social worker and has direct access to psychiatry old age transitional care service, rapid response and reablement.
The team coordinates the discharge of patients referred to it from the accident and emergency department and ward 4 of PRI.