System to track hospital demand

A new web-based service is due to begin on Monday which will ensure ambulances can take patients to a hospital where they can cope with the demand.

NSC-CAMS will act as a barometer measuring bed capacity and patient activity at all eight acute hospitals in Norfolk, Suffolk and Cambridgeshire.

The link-up, which took 18-months to install, is intended to provide better patient care.

It will mean patients can be re-routed depending on hospital waiting times.

"Better for patients"

Project manager from the East Anglian Ambulance Trust Christine Ames said: "It will mean hospitals can ask the ambulance service to route some of the less seriously ill or injured patients to a nearby hospital where there is more capacity to treat them.

"It's about using a whole systems approach to equalise the pressure on the NHS across the whole area, which will be better for patients and better for the hospitals."

There will be strict criteria laid down for which patients can and cannot be routed to a hospital other than the nearest.

No-one seriously ill or injured can be re-routed and the extra journey time to the alternative hospital should not be more than about 15 minutes.

Families will always be informed of the decision, to prevent them going to the wrong hospital.