What people have told us about Urgent and Emergency Care Services
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Healthwatch England looks at people's experiences of urgent and emergency care services, in the light of growing pressure on these services. This briefing is based on the experiences of 9,804 people.
Despite growing pressures on UEC services, there were positive stories about good care from staff, especially paramedics and ambulance staff. However, negative feedback about A&E has increased over time, with people concerned about long waiting times, understaffing, and perceived poor staff attitude.
Feedback about ambulance services is a growing theme, with concerns about waiting times accelerating since April 2022.
People were also concerned about long waiting times to speak to NHS 111 call-handlers and there continues to be confusion over NHS 111 First services.
A nationally representative poll of 2,036 adults (18+) across England, to assess whether public confidence in urgent and emergency care services had changed as a result of the pandemic and what had led to this change, found that:
People are confident that urgent and emergency care services will provide good quality care but are less confident in the timeliness of care.
Confidence in urgent care services changed over the pandemic, and where it changed, it was likely to decrease. Nearly 60% of said their confidence had changed, and over 70% of these said it had decreased either a little or a lot.
Older people were more likely to say their confidence decreased than younger people and more likely to base this change after reading stories in traditional media such as newspapers and TV news.
People don’t think that NHS targets for emergency departments are being met often.
People or their loved ones who were admitted to hospital after using an urgent care service were more likely to say their confidence had increased.