NHS losing millions ‘due to lack of local social care’

The NHS could be losing up to 100 million pounds a year by not sending patients home quick enough.

BBC1's Panorama programme used NHS data from 245 trusts over the past two years to calculate the amount of money spent looking after patients who cannot be discharged due to a lack of social care for them at home.

Professor Keith Willett, NHS England’s director for acute care, said reductions in the budgets of local authorities are causing increased pressures on NHS A&E departments.

He said: "Social care and local authorities have taken a significant reduction. We need to join the services up and one of the key things we have to do is to bring the doctors, the nurses, the social workers back together."

Professor Willett also condemned the current target-centric culture within the NHS, stating it was too crude and blunt, although he did concede no better alternative has been suggested.