Nearly 150,000 people aged 90 and over wait 12 hours in emergency rooms in England each year | NHS
Nearly 150,000 people aged 90 and over in England are forced to wait longer than 12 hours in emergency rooms every year, with some suffering “truly shocking” waits of days stuck in corridors, a report has warned.
Older people are also left in their own waste with wet beds for hours, denied painkillers and forced to watch and hear other patients die alongside them because they end up waiting too long for care, according to Age UK.
In total, more than 1 million patients aged 60 and over had to wait more than 12 hours to be transferred, admitted or discharged from type 1 emergency departments in 2024-2025. One in three (33%) aged 90 or over – 149,293 people – had to wait more than 12 hours.
Caroline Abrahams, director of the charity Age UK, said: “What happens to some very sick older people when they come to A&E is a crisis hidden in plain sight that the government must confront and take immediate action to solve.
“No one should spend their final days in a hospital corridor where it is impossible for staff to provide good, compassionate care, and it is truly shocking that this is what is happening to some older people in some hospitals, today and every day.”
The report detailed how an elderly woman died of a heart attack after being left to wait; An 86-year-old man went “missing” in hospital after being placed in a deserted driveway; And a man was left on a chair on an IV drip for 20 hours and soiled himself because he couldn’t get to the toilet.
A 79-year-old man featured in the report likened care in corridors in 2025 to historical war films with “queues of stretchers and people suffering”.
The report also included accounts of “pools of urine” on floors, where immobile patients were unable to go to the toilet, and patients had to use bed sheets in public hallways.
Age UK said that because of previous negative and upsetting experiences, many older patients were now reluctant or even unwilling to go to an emergency department, even if they were facing a life-threatening situation.
One widow told the charity: “My very ill late husband, with a drip machine, was put in a chair… He was desperate to go to the bathroom and there was no one to take him. He was left with faeces in his trousers, left in this state for over 20 hours. How terrible he felt – he had no humility.”
“Many of the stories we hear from seniors and their families are heartbreaking, and to make matters worse, the older you get, the more likely you are to endure a long and often uncomfortable wait,” Abrahams said.
“Care in corridors and long waits in A&E rooms are a rot at the heart of the NHS, undermining public confidence and destroying the ability of committed hospital staff to be able to take pride in a job well done. As a result, we fear that poor quality care in and around some A&E departments is now almost to be expected – a truly dire situation that we must act urgently to change.”
She said ministers must develop a plan to end long waits in emergency rooms and care corridors, with specific deadlines and milestones.
“There is a lot that hospitals themselves can do to improve the situation in their emergency departments, but what we need now is for the government to step up, show decisive leadership and use all the tools at its disposal – including targets, inspection and funding – to end this crisis, which is disproportionately harming our oldest.”
Liberal Democrat MP Helen Morgan, the party’s health spokeswoman, also urged ministers to introduce a plan to “end corridor care”.
“These horrific stories – of elderly men and women crammed into hospital corridors, left in their own waste, unable to drink and eat – have no place in a modern or decent society,” she said.
Professor Nicola Ringer, from the Royal College of Nursing, described the report as “devastating” and said long waiting times in the emergency room were a “moral disgrace” on the NHS. “No elderly or vulnerable person should be forced to endure these conditions,” she added. “It is unsafe, offensive and unacceptable.
“Overworked and understaffed nursing teams work hard every day to provide the best care, but they face an impossible task…The reality is that nursing staff and patients are vulnerable to failure because of a system that simply does not work.”
Daniel Elkeles, from NHS Providers, said the Age UK report was “shocking” and stressed why urgent investment in buildings and equipment was needed to boost capacity.
Rory Deaton, from the NHS Confederation, called for “viable alternatives” to A&E for some patients, including better access to GPs, drop-in centers and local supports for falls and frailty.
Health Minister Karen Smith, MP, described the report as “heartbreaking”. She said: “No one should receive care in the corridor, it is unacceptable and degrading and we are determined to put an end to it.”
She added that the government is investing £450 million in new urgent and emergency care centres, buying 500 ambulances and building 40 mental health crisis centres.