People's views on A&E waiting times

To inform the NHS Long Term Plan, and the review of clinical standards, Healthwatch England have been looking at what factors people think are most important when visiting A&E and how these could be used to support a more meaningful measure of performance. 

Here we draw on two main sources of evidence:

• Feedback gathered by the Healthwatch network from almost 6,500 people between January 2016 and September 2018, covering A&E departments in 25 different local areas.
• National polling of a representatives group of 2,000 adults from across the country on what they think matters most when visiting A&E (conducted in January 2019).

These findings are being published today to coincide with the announcement from NHS England about plans to test a new set of performance measures in A&E.

This process of testing is essential to ensure that the proposed measures have a positive impact on clinical outcomes, patient safety and people’s experiences of care.

Ultimately, the aim must be to create a trusted measure that helps track hospital performance that is of use to both professionals and the public.