We are facing a challenging Bank Holiday weekend as a high number of very sick people are receiving care and our hospitals are very busy. In response to this pressure, all our partners are pulling together across primary care, community care, mental health and social care to help us. 

If you or your family need urgent care, there are lots of ways you can get the treatment you need, including several services open over the coming days.

For urgent but non life-threatening medical advice, you should visit NHS 111 online, or call 111. This service can also book you an appointment in the relevant place, if needed. For more information, visit our ‘where to get the right treatment’ page.

Out-of-hours GP appointments are available over the Easter weekend. If you struggle to get an appointment with your GP, your local pharmacist is also able to offer advice.

Seeking urgent care in the right place for you will ensure you get the treatment you or your family need quickly. Watch this short video for more information on your route to urgent care.

Patients in our Emergency Departments (EDs) are seen in order of clinical need, so anyone not requiring emergency treatment will face long wait times.

Matthew Trainer, our Chief Executive, said: “Like many parts of the NHS, the health service in north east London is under significant pressure as we enter the Easter weekend. I am grateful to all our partners for the work they are undertaking to encourage people to only attend our EDs if it is an emergency.

“At times, across the country, people are waiting too long for an ambulance and ambulances are waiting too long at hospitals to hand over patients. One of the reasons for delayed handovers is lack of beds. We have a constant focus on the need to discharge patients as soon as it is safe to do so and we’re seeking to achieve this by having a senior doctor review every patient, in every bed, every day.”

Our Ambulance Receiving Centre is freeing up valuable paramedic time, allowing patients to be taken off a trolley and into a better clinical environment.

We’ve also created a special area in the ED at Queen’s Hospital to provide care on the day and reduce the number of patients needing to be admitted. This has helped increase the number of beds available in our hospitals, meaning fewer patients waiting for more than 12 hours to be admitted from our ED since it was opened last month. 

Matthew added: “This new area has seen the average wait time in our ED reduce by 12.6 per cent.

“While waits are still far too long, our team has made a change and it’s working, with more to come.”