FOURTEEN years. That was the amount of days in a York Hospital bed that were lost over the last financial year because of "bed blocking" - most of them because patients could not get to the nursing home of their choice.

Today, The Press can reveal shocking figures which show that thousands of hospital bed days were lost because patients were delayed in being discharged when they were clinically fit to leave.

Hospital nursing director Mike Proctor said about three-quarters of those under the NHS's responsibility were people who stayed in hospital because a space in the nursing home of their choice was not available. One elderly patient finally left their hospital bed earlier this year after being delayed there for EIGHT months - the longest single delay in York since April 1, 2004 - for this reason. At a cost of about £300 per single bed day, this single delay would have cost about £71,700.

Mr Proctor said: "It's a significant problem. It's not in patients' best interests to languish in hospital waiting for a nursing home place."

The figures, released by York Hospitals NHS Trust under the Freedom of Information Act, show:

During 2005/6 a total of 6,081 bed days were lost because of delayed discharge - the equivalent of more than 16 years

5,168 of these days were down to the responsibility of the NHS, mostly because patients could not get into the nursing home of their choice

903 days were lost because the relevant local authority could not find a suitable placement in community care

In 2004/5, 7079 bed days were lost because of bed blocking, of which 5,580 were the responsibility of the NHS and 1,499 of local authorities.

Mr Proctor said the NHS took responsibility for patients who were delayed in leaving hospital because the nursing home of their choice had no spaces available.

These spaces included rehabilitation beds at St Helen's Nelson Court, or White Cross Court in Wilson Drive, Huntington Road, York.

Local authorities were responsible for bed days lost because no suitable place in community care was available when they were ready to leave hospital. Under Government rules, they can be fined for these delays.

Total bed blocking costs last year would have come to £1.5 million for days lost under NHS responsibility, and £271,000 under that of councils.

Mr Proctor said: "It causes a problem for patients because we are not a home environment, but it's using resources that are actually earmarked for something else. It costs us money and limits our ability to use that resource for the patients that are actually ill and need that level of care.

"What we are trying to do is to say to patients where they are waiting for a nursing home of their choice, we would encourage them to use a spare bed in another nursing home while they are waiting.

"We need to talk to patients and relatives and we need to be clear with patients and relatives that long term delays which result in far longer hospital stays where people are waiting for their nursing home of choice is inappropriate."

He said social services departments and York and North Yorkshire councils had reduced numbers of lost bed days "massively" over the past couple of years.

Getting the lowdown on bed blocking

HERE is what Selby and York Primary Care Trust and councils in our area said about bed blocking.

Heather Rice, director of health and social care for Selby and York Primary Care Trust, said: "Some of this work (to reduce delayed care transfers) includes enhancing community services to support people on their discharge from hospital. It is also about developing joint policies to look at how the local health and social care community can encourage those patients waiting for their first choice of residential, or nursing home, to consider moving to an alternative option until their choice becomes available."

Bill Hodson, City of York Council's director of housing and adult social services, said the council had not paid any bed blocking fines during the last two years.

He said: "We are very proud to have reduced the number of days that a bed is blocked by someone who is the responsibility of the council by almost 40 per cent between 2004/5 and 2005/6.

"Our aim has been to keep the numbers of people delayed who are the responsibility of the council to no more than two or three at any given time.

"Overall, we have been successful in that and for many weeks during the past year there were no people awaiting discharge."

North Yorkshire County Council said it had paid £2,700 in bed blocking fines for 2005/6 up to December last year, but none of them were made in respect of York Hospital.

A spokeswoman said: "North Yorkshire County Council achieves excellent performance across the county, which is noted by the Commission for Social Care Inspection (CSCI) as part of their annual review of North Yorkshire social services."

A spokeswoman for East Riding of Yorkshire Council said it had only reimbursed the NHS for delayed discharge in one case in the past few years. She said: "We have a good record in quickly discharging patients and our team based in Pocklington has very good working relationships with the staff at York Hospital."

Updated: 09:12 Saturday, May 06, 2006