Hospital rewarded for A&E success

The Kent hospital has improved access for A&E emergencies

A hospital trust has received £100,000 for keeping accident and emergency waiting times to under four hours.

Since April, the Medway Maritime Hospital in Gillingham, Kent, has ensured that at least 96% of patients were seen within four hours of arrival.

Local Labour MP Paul Clark said the award honoured the hard work of staff.

"This is all due to the extremely hard work done by the staff in Medway and it is great that they have been awarded for all of their hard work

Short-stay wards

"I am proud of Medway NHS Trust for reaching this goal - I feel safe knowing that our local NHS trust does treat people within the necessary time frame," he said.

The hospital's A&E unit has improved access for emergencies by estimating expected numbers of patients, improving admission processes, making greater use of short-stay wards and using new up-to-the-minute information on bed availability.

The government money is in addition to another £100,000 received by the Medway NHS Trust for regularly seeing over 94% of patients within that timescale.

The money will be used throughout the Medway NHS Trust to develop services.

All hospitals will be expected to admit, transfer or discharge 98% of patients within four hours by the end of December.