POLITICIANS have welcomed plans to tackle the county’s bedblocking crisis.

Oxfordshire has been notorious for having one of the worst rates of bedblocking in the country – where patients are stranded in hospital beds when they are healthy enough to go home.

But health bosses unveiled plans on Thursday to tackle the problem by moving delayed patients into specially-commissioned care home beds to free up the hospital space.

Witney MP David Cameron welcomed the plans – which were drawn up by the Oxford University Hospitals Foundation Trust, OXford Health, the county council and Oxfordshire Clinical Commissioning Group (OCCG).

He said: “Bedblocking has been a long-standing problem in Oxfordshire. I am pleased that the local Trusts, the CCG and the county council are working together to find ways to tackle this and I look forward to seeing how the Better Care Action Plan works.”

There are currently 150 delayed patients, who will be moved to nursing homes in their areas for a maximum of eight weeks to free up the hospital beds.

Once there the patients will be assessed and given the care they need to go home.

Oxford East MP Andrew Smith said it was a good sign that health leaders were “getting to grips” with the problem. He added: “I welcome this initiative to tackle the long-standing problem of delayed discharge, which is bad for patients as well as wasting money on expensive hospital beds for patients whose ongoing care is better and more safely provided outside hospital.

“There will be challenges in trying to ensure that patients go to areas which are convenient for their families, but we all have to hope that these can be worked out and that the initiative succeeds where previous approaches have failed.”

Banbury MP Victoria Prentis said: “It is obviously better for people not to be in hospital unless they really need to be. Delayed transfers have been a real problem in our area for some time.

“I will look at the plans with interest, and am pleased they have been shared.”

Wantage MP Ed Vaizey said: “This is a great example of joined- up working that is needed to create efficiencies in the NHS.”

Henley MP John Howell didn’t respond to requests from the Oxford Mail for a comment.