NHS sets corridor care definition and orders trusts to publish data

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By Daniel Pye

The NHS has now officially defined corridor care as part of a move to force hospital trusts to collect and publish data on it.

Under the terms set by NHS England (NHSE), if a patient has spent at least 45 minutes in a clinically inappropriate area of the emergency department or a ward they have received corridor care.

The government pledged to end corridor care in January as doctors complained it is being “normalised”, saying it would work with NHS England to improve data collection.

In a letter to trust leaders, Sarah-Jane Marsh, NHSE national priority programme director in urgent and emergency care, confirmed that data would start to be collected on this basis, with publications starting each month from May on NHSE's website.

If progress has been made, the organisation aims to revise the threshold for corridor care down to 30 minutes in 2027/28.

All individual cases meeting the definition should be reported as an incident once NHSE has refined its existing guidance on providing corridor care.