MORE than 100 hospital beds are being blocked by pensioners in the Southampton area because of a cash crisis in social services.

Many of the elderly patients, who are fit enough to leave hospital, are having to wait in community hospitals because Southampton City Council cannot afford to place them in nursing or residential homes.

Others are waiting for a funded package of social and health care before they can safely be discharged home.

And now health chiefs are warning that the delays are pushing up waiting lists and that the situation will get worse in the winter months.

Southampton University Hospitals Trust said the delays would cause "serious problems" if the situation deteriorated. The trust, which runs Southampton General and the Royal South Hants hospitals, cannot transfer pensioners to rehabilitation beds in the community because these are also taken up by OAPs whose discharge has been delayed.

Roger Bingham, a spokesman for Southampton Community Health Services NHS Trust, said: "We have currently got about 100 delayed discharge beds, but we're working on ways to help patients go home earlier where possible, by working with social services and families.

"We do recognise that the financial pressures on social services are causing significant delays and at a time of very high medical admissions and with winter now looming."

John Beer, the head of Southampton Social Services, said: "Of the 100 beds currently blocked, by no means are all of these the result of social services funding issues - many of them will be Hampshire County Council's.

"At any one time, there are also a number of people waiting to move to the nursing home of their choice, and this also takes up bed spaces.

"Having said this, however, we are always very conscious of delayed discharge and we are working closely with health colleagues to review the situation on a weekly basis."

A spokeswoman for Hampshire Social Services said: "We have not been informed of any significant problems relating to Hampshire Social Services through our normal communication channels with the trusts.

"A delayed discharge could arise for reasons other than funding.

"Tthe patient could be waiting for specialist assessments including occupational therapy and physiotherapy, for example."

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