CASH-strapped health bosses admit bedblocking will continue to be a problem across the county until the “fundamentally wrong” system is changed.

The problem is estimated to cost the NHS in Oxfordshire about £9m a year because patients are being left stranded in beds when they are healthy enough to go home.

Oxfordshire Clinical Commissioning Group (OCCG) chief executive David Smith yesterday told a meeting of health leaders that bedblocking would not be fixed without more investment.

Speaking at the county council’s health overview and scrutiny committee at County Hall, he added: “We still have very high levels of delayed transfers across Oxfordshire. My view as a professional is that a large part of that is that the structure of the system is just fundamentally wrong.”

The latest figures show that the average number of delayed transfers of care across the system is 174 – 155 of them within the Oxford University Hospitals Trust (OUHT).

This is a rise from an average of 131 delayed transfers of care within the trust in June, while the average number of patients stranded in beds in May was 152.

The trust was rated bottom in the country for bedblocking in January and the second worst in March.

According to the county council, the number of cases in 2014/15 was 21 per cent higher than the previous year.

In January, Oxfordshire health services were handed £520,000 to deliver a “rapid” improvement in bedblocking cases.

The OUHT’s director of clinical services, Paul Brennan, said the number of delayed transfers of care was the equivalent of filling six of the trust’s 67 wards across the John Radcliffe, the Churchill and Banbury’s Horton General hospitals.

The trust, which also runs the Nuffield Orthopaedic Centre, launched a campaign to tackle the problem in April. It brought in more care staff and patient transport services and offered earlier operation times.

But Mr Smith said: “The challenge for the NHS is we need some money up front to fund new ways of working while we are able to move away from what we are doing.

“While the Government provides the money, that money is not there.

“We have got to move away from some of the old models – that’s going to be really, really challenging in some parts of Oxfordshire.”

Mr Smith pledged to bring a report on the issue to the next meeting of committee in November, but he said there was not an easy answer.

He added: “I am not going to bring some answers to the next meet- ing. We are a long way off from that.”

The problem has sparked concerns from patients and public watchdogs, with Healthwatch Oxfordshire urging leaders to act to improve the discharge process.

Mr Brennan said the OUHT had just completed a “perfect week” of analysing the situation to try to establish what was causing the delays.

He said the trust would also bring a detailed report before the committee at its next meeting.