Aiming to discharge elderly Whipps Cross patients within 24 hours “inevitably de-humanises” them and risks “corners being cut”, according to a local charity.

During the Covid pandemic, the hospital in Leytonstone set up an “integrated discharge hub” to free up beds by discharging older or frail patients as soon as they were “medically optimised”.

Despite being introduced as a crisis management measure, the hub is now a “business-as-usual model” and discharged 8,721 patients in the first nine months of this year, mostly to their own homes.

In theory, patients being sent home are first cared for by a “bridging” team, tasked with providing care and ensuring equipment like grab rails or bathroom aids is installed.

However, at Waltham Forest Council meeting about adult social care on 4th November, Terry Day from Waltham Forest Age UK highlighted three cases involving elderly people the charity supports where this did not happen.

Given Age UK supports only 160 elderly people in the borough, a “minute proportion” of those discharged by Whipps, she added: “We believe, therefore, that these are not simply outlier cases where normal practice has not been followed.

“We believe they must illustrate system-wide problems – we have come across many such examples.”

Cases highlighted by Terry included an 80-year-old woman with lung cancer who was sent home despite her home having no hot water.

In the following days, carers told the woman to use incontinence pads instead of helping her to the toilet.

In another recent case, the neighbours of an 88-year-old woman with dementia had to help her to the toilet for several days because the home carers did not arrive until late morning.

The neighbours, who already acted as a close support network, did not know she was being sent home from the hospital until an ambulance arrived on their street.

Community NHS trust NELFT, Whipps Cross and Waltham Forest Council prepared a report for the committee that accepted the quality of service is sometimes “not optimal”.

Zaynah Dinah, NELFT’s interim director of unplanned care, told the committee: “We’re definitely aware there is room to work on that and that work has already started.”

Anna Saunders, Waltham Forest’s assistant director of integrated commissioning, told the committee it is “really challenging” to find home care staff or residential care home places at the moment.

She added: “The key thing is that care providers don’t take on people they can’t provide for and it’s important that we don’t release them until they’re ready.”

During the pandemic, spikes in Covid patients led to a shortage of beds at the hospital, highlighted during an inquest into the death of pregnant teacher Sumera Haq at the hospital last August.

However, the North East London NHS hopes to reduce the demand for Whipps Cross hospital beds, despite a growing local population, by improving community care.

It is so confident that this is achievable that plans for the new hospital originally suggested a reduction in beds, before public outrage forced an apparent U-turn.

The discharge hub team has now listed actions to improve its system, including a review of planning, welfare checks and taking a “patient voice” approach.

Councillors at the meeting recommended a next-day welfare call be made to all discharged patients and agreed to scrutinise “continence arrangements” during home care at a future meeting.

Following the meeting, Terry told the Local Democracy Reporting Service: “I was glad to see the powers that be are taking this issue seriously, and I very much hope things will improve.”