A number of hospital trusts in Greater Manchester have been ranked among the worst for waiting times at A&E departments across the country.
Five NHS trusts across the region saw patients waiting over 12 hours to be admitted, transferred or discharged after presenting at accident and emergency in February.
For the first time, NHS England has published data on the number of patients having to wait more than 12 hours - and ranked trusts accordingly.
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The hospital trust in our region with the highest proportion of people having to wait over 12 hours in February this year was Wrightington, Wigan and Leigh NHS Foundation Trust, where 19.7 per cent of patients had to wait for this amount of time.
Elsewhere across Greater Manchester, of the 7,615 people who attended Bolton NHS Foundation Trust in February, 1,120 or 14.7 per cent had to wait more than 12 hours.
All data has been rounded to the nearest five attendances and is provisional, reports the PA news agency.
The latest figures come as junior doctors staged four days of strike action after a row overpay. Medics formed picket lines outside a number of hospitals across the region this week.
An estimated 350,000 appointments, including operations, were expected to have been cancelled across the country as a result of the action that follows years of what critics say are real-terms pay cuts that the government refuses to rectify.
The government say will they will not enter talks unless the British Medical Association drop their demand for a 35 per cent pay rise and call-off the strikes.
The new NHS data has been ranked by the proportion of all attendances waiting over 12 hours starting with the highest, and reads, from left to right: name of NHS trust; total attendances at major A&E departments in February; number of attendances waiting over 12 hours to be admitted, transferred or discharged; percentage of all attendances waiting over 12 hours to be admitted, transferred or discharged.
Greater Manchester hospital trusts where patients waited more than 12 hours...
Wrightington, Wigan and Leigh NHS Foundation Trust: 6,960 attendees; 1,370 waited more than 12 hours - 19.7 per cent
Bolton NHS Foundation Trust: 7,615 attendees; 1,120 waited more than 12 hours - 14.7 per cent
Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust: 24,100 attendees; 3,275 waited more than 12 hours - 13.6 per cent
Stockport NHS Foundation Trust: 7,980 attendees; 830 waited more than 12 hours - 10.4 per cent
Tameside and Glossop Integrated Care NHS Foundation Trust: attendees 7,170; 370 waited more than 12 hours - 5.2 per cent
What the hospital trusts say...
The trusts released together a joint statement when approached by the Manchester Evening News.
Gill Baker, programme director for urgent and emergency care at NHS Greater Manchester, said: "NHS services in Greater Manchester, like many parts of the country, have been experiencing high demand. We recognise that this means many patients spent a long time in our emergency departments, as we prioritise those with the most urgent clinical need.
"Our ongoing priority has been to work with partners to improve wait times, support timely discharge and ensure that people know where they can get medical help from, other than A&E. We have also increased capacity in the 111 service to support patients being seen by the right service as soon as possible.
"The development of services such as our Urgent Eyecare Service (UES), which provides urgent care and treatment to anyone experiencing emergency problems with their eyes, allows our patients to see specialists as quickly as possible and reduces the need for hospital visits. In addition, increased access to primary care with patients now able to book GP appointments for evenings and weekends, helps provides a solution for patients who may otherwise have gone to A&E.
"Our staff have been working hard to provide patients with quality care and we are grateful for their efforts against a backdrop of challenges.
"We encourage members of the public to continue to come forward for urgent care that they need, only using 999 or attending A&E in an emergency. We ask them to use 111 online to identify the right service for them such as local pharmacists and GPs."
Mary Fleming, deputy chief executive at Wrightington, Wigan and Leigh Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (WWL) added: "Continued pressures, and a high number of patients attending our Emergency Department has meant that WWL continues to see pressures on our urgent and emergency care system, just like many NHS organisations up and down the country.
"Unfortunately, this has led to patients experiencing significantly longer waits. The Trust is tackling this issue in different ways, such as utilising our Same Day Emergency Care unit to divert patients away from A&E to a more appropriate level of care, which includes rapid assessment, diagnosis and treatment without being admitted to a ward, and, if clinically safe to do so, a return home.
"Our pioneering Virtual Ward service is also playing a huge part, allowing patients to be monitored and treated within the comfort of their own homes. Our clinical and community colleagues are also working together with our primary care partners across the Wigan Borough health system to better understand our patient population and their needs.
"This includes looking at how to better provide care in the community while recognising that primary care systems are also under pressure.
"We are extremely grateful for the support we have received from the public, and to further help us to continue to provide safe and effective care, we urge families and friends of patients who are ready to be discharged from our hospitals to support their loved ones to recover at home.
"Our discharge teams are working incredibly hard to make sure this transition is safe, and recovery at home is always the best option.
"The Emergency Department is not always the first place to come when you require medical attention. If your condition is not life or limb-threatening, visit NHS 111 online in the first instance or call 111, contact your GP, contact a local pharmacy for advice, or visit an Urgent Treatment Centre."
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