Dr. Mike O'Connor:

I could not agree more. In the last year to date, more than 16,000 people over the age of 75 have spent over 24 hours in our emergency departments. It is a specific focus of the winter plan, which our chief operations officer, just called out. It has a specific focus on these areas, particularly for those over 75 because they do not tolerate those delays; in fact, it causes illness and morbidity and prolongs their length of stay. These bespoke winter plans are for each individual site. We have asked them to particularly look at what material differences would be made by focusing on what staff they would require. Often, it is therapy staff or more medical staff who are trained for geriatric medicine. Often in these bespoke plans, it is specific areas in the emergency department that these patients will get to quicker. If they are able to go home, interlinking with community services, they will go home, or if they go up to a ward, they will go up to a ward faster. It is underpinned in the winter plan, if one reads through it. It is a key area of focus, namely, staffing, how we deal with these patients, how we operationally manage them and how we flag them up in the hospital. This must not happen. We must reduce this number.