HOSPITAL bosses say they are still waiting to hear about money for planned expansions at A&E departments after the county was not included in a list of trusts set to share millions in government cash to prepare for the busy winter.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Tuesday, August 11 that NHS trusts across the country would be sharing £300 million to upgrade facilities ahead of winter, but Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust was one of only a handful to not be included.

Bosses said several bids have already been made for money to approve facilities, including the A&E at Worcestershire Royal Hospital in Worcester, which the trust is currently waiting to hear a decision on.

However, they would not reveal what bids had been made and the nature of the bids.

The trust submitted a £60 million bid to the Department for Health to expand several facilities, including the A&E department, at the start of the year.

Paul Brennan, deputy chief executive and chief operating officer at Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust, said: “We have submitted a number of bids for capital funding to further improve facilities for our emergency departments and other urgent and emergency care services across the trust. We are waiting to hear the outcome of these bids.”

The emergency department at Worcestershire Royal Hospital was rated inadequate following an inspection by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) in February.

The health regulator whilst praising staff said the department was “under adverse pressure” with “significant” overcrowding. The report also criticised delays in assessing patients arriving by ambulance.

The emergency department at the city’s hospital had previously been in special measures for around four years but was given a better rating of “requires improvement” following an inspection in May last year.

The boost for hospitals comes after the trust had hundreds of millions of pounds of debt written off by the government in April.

The government boost for the county’s hospital trust meant £321 million was immediately wiped from its debts not long after it was revealed bosses were facing an ongoing debt of £80 million in the last year alone.

The write-off also meant almost £10 million extra was available to the trust instead of the £2.2 million it had been expecting.