Patients treated in cupboards

Health Emergency chairman Geoff Martin made the comments following a Nursing Times survey that revealed over 60 per cent of nurses were aware of patients being routinely treated in mop cupboards, TV rooms and corridors.

The poll of more than 900 nurses showed almost 80 per cent believed this resulted in patient safety being put at risk and 29 per cent admitted it happened every day.

Nurses highlighted specific issues around safety with senior staff, including patients having no access to call bells or water, as well as a lack of emergency equipment and fire exits being blocked.

But only 4 per cent said the practice had been stopped.

Hospitals being "full" and a fear that the government's four-hour A&E target for patients to be seen will not be met, leading to unnecessary hospital admissions, were some of the reasons given for why non-clinical areas had to be used.

But Mr Martin warned of much worse to come if planned bed cuts, including over 30 per cent of the current capacity in London, were bulldozed through.

He said: "If NHS London get its way, a third of the current hospital beds in the capital will be ripped out of the system at a time when nurses are already making it clear that the crisis is so severe that patients are being treated in cupboards and that hospitals are dangerously short of capacity."

The Patients Association charity director Katherine Murphy said: "Not only is this potentially unsafe, but it is completely undignified.

"In extreme circumstances the NHS might need to resort to this, but the results of this survey suggest it is a widespread practice."

A spokesman for the Department of Health passed the buck to local health-care commissioners and providers, saying that it was their responsibility "to assess the services needed locally to meet the demands of their population."