Critical incident declared across health services in Surrey Heartlands

Update: 12 January 2023

On Saturday 7 January 2023, the Surrey Heartlands health and care system moved from a critical incident into a business continuity incident. This was in place until 12 January 2023, when the system moved out of business continuity incident. This reflected a significant amount of work by teams across the system, resulting in an improved position, although services remain busy and work continues to address some ongoing challenges. Surrey and Sussex Healthcare Trust remains in business continuity.

The advice below continues to apply if people need to access health advice – you can help your local NHS by using the right service so we can make sure people who are critically ill are seen as quickly as possible.

We would like to thank everyone working in the system, across all services and all organisations, for everything they continue to do as they care for, and support, patients and their families during what continues to be a very busy time.

Due to the significant ongoing pressure on local NHS services, alongside the need to act swiftly to ensure patients continue to receive safe, high quality care we have declared a critical incident across health services in Surrey Heartlands. 

We are seeing record numbers of people attending A&E, calling NHS111, accessing GP services and calling 999; ongoing challenges in discharging patients who are well enough to leave hospital to create capacity for patients coming in; and we are seeing an increase in staff sickness - all of which has led to longer waits than we would like for patients to receive the care they need.

Because of these pressures, the local health and care system has taken the decision to escalate to a critical incident which allows us to be able to take additional steps to maintain safe services for our patients and help us cope with the growing pressures.

Unfortunately, this does mean local organisations may need to reschedule some non-urgent operations, treatments and outpatient appointments to accommodate those patients with the most urgent clinical need. People should attend appointments unless they are contacted; cancer and our other most urgent operations continue to be prioritised.

Our teams continue to work exceptionally hard; and we would like to reassure our patients and the public that despite the challenges faced and some changes to non-urgent appointments, essential services remain fully open for anyone who needs them so if you require urgent medical help, please continue to come forward.

The public can help us manage these periods of demand by ensuring they are seeking help from the most appropriate health services, and only attending A&E for serious accidents and emergencies. If you are unwell, see NHS 111 online for 24/7 advice about the most appropriate care for your needs or call NHS 111, although phone lines remain very busy.