Queen Alexandra Hospital patients at 'significant risk' due to on-going critical incident amid nationwide NHS blood and IT crises

Portsmouth Hospitals University NHS Trust announced the critical incident on Tuesday and said it would notify the public when the status is lifted.

The incident means that staff and resources are being redirected to life-threatening conditions, and the hospital’s A&E department will be operating a ‘strict redirection’ to alternative service, according to a representative from the Trust.

Queen Alexandra Hospital is working to ensure all urgent treatment and procedures are continuing, without cancellation of scheduled appointments.

But patients arriving by ambulance face long delays due to repeatedly full emergency department, resulting in ‘significant risk’ to patient safety, according Dr John Knighton, medical director at Portsmouth Hospitals University NHS Trust.

Dr John Knighton added: ‘We need the local community to help us by helping patients get home as soon as possible and only using the Emergency Department for life threatening conditions and injuries.

‘Our immediate priority is to ensure there are beds available for our most seriously ill patients and we will be focusing on safely discharging as many patients as possible. We ask that families and loved ones support us with this and collect patients as soon as they are ready to be discharged.

‘We also urge you to not attend the ED unless it’s an emergency. Non-emergency attendances will not be seen and you will be redirected to the Urgent Treatment Centres at St Mary’s Hospital, Gosport and Petersfield. If you need to know where to get help and support please go to NHS 111 online.’

A critical incident is any localised incident where the level of disruption results in the organisation temporarily or permanently losing its ability to deliver critical services, patients may have been harmed or the environment is not safe, requiring special measures and support from other agencies to restore normal operating functions.

There have been no reports of the critical incident disrupting services outside of Queen Alexandra Hospital, and patients are being encouraged to use their nearest Urgent Treatment Centre for non-emergency care.

The Trust is redirecting patients to St Mary’s Urgent Treatment Centre, the Gosport Urgent Treatment Centre, and the Petersfield Urgent Treatment Centre.

It comes as separate issues are placing pressure on other NHS services across the country, which has seen IT systems malfunction and blood supplies run low.

Hospitals have been hit by the Cerner electronic health record system crashing, but the critical incident at Portsmouth Hospitals University NHS Trust is not related to the system’s issues, according to a representative from the Trust.

Meanwhile a national alert has been issued to protect blood stocks, with the NHS Blood and Transplant service calling on hospitals to consider postponing some non-urgent elective surgeries to ensure blood is prioritised for patients who need it most.

The national amber alert over blood supplies is expected to last at least four weeks.

Donations from O blood groups are in particular need, and residents can use blood.co.uk to check blood donor appointment availability.