WARRINGTON patients will benefit from more hospital beds across the NHS this winter.

Despite ongoing seasonal pressures across the NHS, more than 680 additional permanent staffed beds will be rolled out at hospitals in the north west.

Last year, the NHS committed to delivering an additional 5,000 ‘core’ beds across the country as part of its urgent and emergency care recovery plan.

‘Core’ beds are beds that are permanent, and regularly staffed, so can be sustained over winter, as opposed to temporary ‘escalation’ beds that are used during periods of extreme pressure.

New figures show hospitals across the region had an average of 14,890 ‘core’ beds in place each day, 689 more than it had at the start of the year.

The significant boost means the NHS in the north west now has more general and acute beds in place in its hospitals than it did during the same time period last year to care for our sickest patients.

Dr Michael Gregory, regional medical director for NHS England North West, said: “We’re so grateful to our NHS staff for the remarkable work they continue to do to care for patients in the region, despite the challenges they have faced responding to increased winter pressures this year, growing demand and more people with seasonal viruses, and the impact ongoing industrial action has had.

“It has been a year since the launch of our urgent and emergency care recovery plan, which set out a blueprint for the way the NHS intended to improve services and boost capacity with additional beds, new ambulances and new ways of working.

“There is still a lot of work to do and we will continue to look at ways to expand our capacity in the coming months, but the work done to date has made a real difference and will have improved our ability to provide care for those people sick enough to end up in our hospitals this winter.”