Patients treated in ED corridor due to lack of clinical space
NHS England received 3 coroners' reports about this hazard between 15 Oct 2024 and 22 May 2026.
They came from 1 coroner. A similar concern was raised again 2 times after the first warning.
A published response was found for 2 of the 2 earlier reports, stating 5 specific actions.
The story, report by report
Spacing grows with the time between reports.
“when the Emergency Department of the Royal Sussex County Hospital, Brighton reached capacity patients would be moved to and treated in the corridor as there was no clinical area available to do so”
Original on judiciary.uk ↗ NHS England responded, stating 2 specific actions.Response (PDF) ↗Response (PDF) ↗
“NHS England is working through the operating model so that NHS England's Regions can support providers to eliminate crowding in Emergency Departments in the longer term.”
Web search (Tavily): No evidence found either way
Crowding in Emergency Departments ↗“The report raises concerns over emergency department capacity, poor patient flow and the use of corridor care at Royal Sussex County Hospital (RSCH) and nationally. I understand that your report and matters of concerns have also been sent to NHS England, and they are best placed to respond with the specific actions being taken locally to improve urgent and emergency care performance at RSCH.”
Web search (Tavily): No evidence found either way
General debate on corridor care in the NHS ↗- 10 months later
Raised again · 1st time
Maureen Batchelor↗
5 Aug 2025 · Joanne Andrews · West Sussex, Brighton and Hove
“when the Emergency Department of the Royal Sussex County Hospital, Brighton reached capacity patients would be moved to and treated in the corridor as there was no clinical area available to do so.”
Original on judiciary.uk ↗ NHS England responded, stating 3 specific actions.Response (PDF) ↗Response (PDF) ↗Response (PDF) ↗
“In June 2025, NHS England published the Urgent and Emergency Care (UEC) Plan for 2025/26, which included an ambition to 'improve flow through hospitals with a particular focus on patients waiting over 12 hours and making progress on eliminating corridor care'.”
Stated timescale: 2025/26
Web search (Tavily): No evidence found either way
General debate on corridor care in the NHS ↗“We now have a Direct to specialties so certain categories of patient are accepted by the relevant specialty on presentation to the ED. Our Interim General Manager for Medicine and Urgent Care (Brighton and Haywards Heath) is the Responsive workstream lead for this, and data is collected daily for all specialty referrals from ED, to monitor the response times from the specialties. Specialties in-reach to ED/AMU/SDEC and we operate a 3/2/1 bleep system to ensure this is fast and effective. There”
1 more stated action in the Promises tab.
- 10 months laterIdentical hazardConfidence 0.95 · high
“there were around 20 patients in the corridor as the Department had reached capacity and there was no clinical area available to do so.”
Original on judiciary.uk ↗ Repeated from the earlier report:patientscorridorDepartmentreachedcapacityclinical
NHS England responded.Response (PDF) ↗Response (PDF) ↗Response (PDF) ↗
- All reports to NHS England
Each row is one judged link between an earlier and a later report. Open a row to read both quotes, found word for word in the originals.
2025 → 2026David Smart10 months after Maureen Batchelor · same coronerIdentical hazardConfidence 0.95 · high
Identical hazardConfidence 0.95 · highBoth reports describe patients being treated in emergency department corridors due to lack of clinical space when the department reaches capacity.
Maureen Batchelor · 5 Aug 2025
“when the Emergency Department of the Royal Sussex County Hospital, Brighton reached capacity patients would be moved to and treated in the corridor as there was no clinical area available to do so.”
Original on judiciary.uk ↗ David Smart · 22 May 2026
“there were around 20 patients in the corridor as the Department had reached capacity and there was no clinical area available to do so.”
Original on judiciary.uk ↗ Stated action in the response to the earlier report
“In June 2025, NHS England published the Urgent and Emergency Care (UEC) Plan for 2025/26, which included an ambition to 'improve flow through hospitals with a particular focus on patients waiting over 12 hours and making progress on eliminating corridor care'.”
2024 → 2026David Smart1 year 7 months after Tamara Davis · same coronerIdentical hazardConfidence 0.95 · high
Identical hazardConfidence 0.95 · highBoth reports describe patients being treated in the Emergency Department corridor because the department has reached capacity and lacks a designated clinical area.
Tamara Davis · 15 Oct 2024
“when the Emergency Department of the Royal Sussex County Hospital, Brighton reached capacity patients would be moved to and treated in the corridor as there was no clinical area available to do so”
Original on judiciary.uk ↗ David Smart · 22 May 2026
“there were around 20 patients in the corridor as the Department had reached capacity and there was no clinical area available to do so”
Original on judiciary.uk ↗ Stated action in the response to the earlier report
“NHS England is working through the operating model so that NHS England's Regions can support providers to eliminate crowding in Emergency Departments in the longer term.”
Stated action
“NHS England is working through the operating model so that NHS England's Regions can support providers to eliminate crowding in Emergency Departments in the longer term.”
What happened next: No evidence found either way
The NHS England statement about addressing emergency department crowding lacks a specific timeframe, and no source confirms a defined implementation period for the promised operating model changes.
“The NHS Long Term Plan outlined a commitment to ensuring 70% of Mental Health Liaison services in acute hospitals met the 'Core 24' standard for adults by 2023”
“RCEM Acute Insight Series: Crowding and its Consequences [name redacted], Vice President (Policy) [name redacted], Vice President [name redacted], Policy Administrator Pooja Kumari, Policy Manager November 2021 1 Introduction Emergency Department (ED) crowding is a major threat to public health and represents a serious policy challenge that must be urgently tackled”
“It is up to the government, NHS leaders, and all of us to work together to put a stop to dangerous crowding; avoidable harm; preventable deaths”
No evidence found does not mean the action did not happen.
Stated action
“The report raises concerns over emergency department capacity, poor patient flow and the use of corridor care at Royal Sussex County Hospital (RSCH) and nationally. I understand that your report and matters of concerns have also been sent to NHS England, and they are best placed to respond with the specific actions being taken locally to improve urgent and emergency care performance at RSCH.”
What happened next: No evidence found either way
The promised report raises concerns about emergency department capacity, patient flow and corridor care at Royal Sussex County Hospital and nationally, and notes that NHS England is best placed to respond with specific actions. No timeframe for these actions is provided.
“Several reports have raised concerns about the s”
No evidence found does not mean the action did not happen.
Stated action · timescale: 2025/26
“In June 2025, NHS England published the Urgent and Emergency Care (UEC) Plan for 2025/26, which included an ambition to 'improve flow through hospitals with a particular focus on patients waiting over 12 hours and making progress on eliminating corridor care'.”
What happened next: No evidence found either way
The NHS England Urgent and Emergency Care Plan for 2025/26 includes an ambition to improve hospital flow and eliminate corridor care for patients waiting over 12 hours.
“'Corridor care' is a term used where patients are treated in hospital corridors and other areas that lack the usual facilities for clinical care. Several reports have raised concerns about the s”
“'No patient should ever be put through an experience like this': RCP calls for promised national corrido”
No evidence found does not mean the action did not happen.
Stated action
“We now have a Direct to specialties so certain categories of patient are accepted by the relevant specialty on presentation to the ED. Our Interim General Manager for Medicine and Urgent Care (Brighton and Haywards Heath) is the Responsive workstream lead for this, and data is collected daily for all specialty referrals from ED, to monitor the response times from the specialties. Specialties in-reach to ED/AMU/SDEC and we operate a 3/2/1 bleep system to ensure this is fast and effective. There”
Stated action
“We now have a Direct to specialties so certain categories of patient are accepted by the relevant specialty on presentation to the ED. Our Interim General Manager for Medicine and Urgent Care (Brighton and Haywards Heath) is the Responsive workstream lead for this, and data is collected daily for all specialty referrals from ED, to monitor the response times from the specialties. Specialties in-reach to ED/AMU/SDEC and we operate a 3/2/1 bleep system to ensure this is fast and effective. There”
No specific action could be extracted with a verified quote.
No specific action could be extracted with a verified quote.
No specific action could be extracted with a verified quote.
- Each report's concerns were extracted by Nemotron 3 Nano on Nebius Token Factory, each with a quote copied from the report.
- Concerns from reports to NHS England at least six months apart were compared by meaning (Qwen3 embeddings) and wording (TF-IDF).
- The closest pairs were judged by Nemotron 3 Super with reasoning on. Only identical or closely related, with confidence of at least 0.70, are shown.
- Every quote was checked by code as an exact substring of the original text. Names of staff and family are redacted, and the deceased are named by report title only.
| Link | Meaning | Wording | Judge | Coroner |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 → 2026 | 0.85 | 0.51 | Identical · 0.95 | same |
| 2024 → 2026 | 0.82 | 0.44 | Identical · 0.95 | same |
Judge model: nvidia/nemotron-3-super-120b-a12b. How Nemotron did the work · Full methodology.
Next
Other chains for NHS England
- Delayed referral for neurosurgical care2 reports · 2017–2026
- Inadequate medical documentation oversight2 reports · 2024–2026
- Lack of basic first aid training and CPR training and defibrillator use by Prison Officers and Staff3 reports · 2015–2026
- Inadequate weekend mental health provision at prison3 reports · 2016–2026
This shows that a similar concern was raised again after an earlier report. It does not say why, and it is not a finding about any organisation or person. To report an error, see the corrections route.