Guy’s minor injuries unit still shutting at 4pm six months after ‘temporary’ cut

Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust announced in March that the nurse practitioners based at Guy's would be redeployed to the accident and emergency department at St Thomas' Hospital to cope with the early evening rush.

At the time the trust said that the cutback in hours at Guy's minor injuries unit would last for just two months, but six months later the reduced schedule remains in operation.

When the minor injuries unit at Guy's Hospital was set up to replace the previous accident and emergency department it was open for 14.5 hours a day. The hours were later cut back to 12 hours a day.

Since March the unit has been open just eight hours a day, from 8am to 4pm, with the last patient admitted at 3.15pm.

"The minor injuries unit at Guy's Hospital is continuing to close at 4pm rather than at 8pm seven days a week as we are still seeing large numbers of people in our A&E at St Thomas' in the early evening," said a spokeswoman for the trust.

"This enables us to transfer our highly specialist emergency nurse practitioners from the Guy's site to the A&E at St Thomas' – one of the busiest in the capital. By doing so, we can treat A&E patients more quickly and prevent waiting times building up and having a serious knock-on effect into the evening.

"We are continuing to review the situation at both our hospital sites on a monthly basis and apologise to any patients wanting to use the minor injuries unit at Guy's in the early evening."