Ealing Hospital is one of four local hospitals along with Hillingdon, Northwick Park and Chelsea & Westminster to get Government funding for new discharge lounges to help cut A&E waiting times.
The new lounges will see new beds and chairs as well as improved facilities to make them more comfortable fof patients while they wait to leave hospital.
According to the NHS, the improved discharge lounges will help free up hospital beds and reduce waiting times for patients to be admitted from A&E.
The new facilities are part of a £50 million investment that was announced by the Health and Social Care Secretary Steve Barclay in January.
NHSE national director of integrated urgent and emergency care and NHSE deputy chief operating officer, Sarah-Jane Marsh said: “The hard work of health and social care teams across the country has meant we have seen improvements in ambulance response times and A&E performance since December, despite the impact of seasonal viruses, industrial action, and higher than usual bed occupancy.
“These dedicated spaces, alongside the range of actions we have outlined in our urgent and emergency care recovery plan, including thousands of new beds, hundreds of new ambulances and measures to help treat more people in the community, will help us further improve patient experience and help avoid unnecessary hospital admissions ahead of next winter.”
Charlotte Benjamin, chief medical officer for North West London ICS, added: “We know people sometimes wait too long in A&E and this is really welcome funding to make sure we can keep people comfortable whilst they wait to go home but also ensure that we start seeing the next patient as soon as possible.
“This is one of a number of initiatives being put in place across North West London to improve flow through our hospital and reduce waiting times.”
