‘Ministers appear to have been sitting on their hands and not learning the lessons from the first wave.
You tend to have more patients that are not intubated and ventilated than are using other therapies. From a staffing point of view, it would also make sense to have it as a step down facility so you’re not then required to staff it with intensive care doctors and nurses who are already in short supply.”
Dr Rinesh Parmar, DAUK
Ministers have been accused of “sitting on their hands” over warnings that the country’s largest Covid-19 field hospital is ill-prepared to help the capital cope with a second wave of infections.
Last week, Matt Hancock, the Health Secretary, confirmed that the Nightingale hospitals set up earlier this year would be ready to receive patients once again as conventional hospitals in some parts of the country faced becoming overwhelmed.
However, despite warnings in the spring that the London Nightingale needed to undergo a transformation to play a significant role over the winter, NHS England has admitted that no changes have been made to the facilities since the field hospital was put on “standby” in May.
The hospital, which has the potential to accommodate up to 4,000 patients, was constructed at east London’s ExCeL exhibition centre in April.
It was initially set up to provide up to 500 intensive care beds, but only cared for 51 patients, and senior critical care medics had suggested that it should instead adopt the ‘step down’ model used for the temporary hospitals in Manchester and Birmingham.
Research has shown that far fewer patients require ventilators than was previously thought, but the London Nightingale is designed for patients who have already been put on ventilators and require ongoing critical care.
Dr Rinesh Parmar, a specialist registrar in anaesthetics who chairs the Doctors’ Association, said: “Ministers appear to have been sitting on their hands and not learning the lessons from the first wave.
“You tend to have more patients that are not intubated and ventilated than are using other therapies. From a staffing point of view, it would also make sense to have it as a step down facility so you’re not then required to staff it with intensive care doctors and nurses who are already in short supply.”
Read the full article in The Daily Telegraph here.
