Two major NHS hospital trusts in Nottinghamshire have declared critical incidents, signalling a severe crisis as a surge in winter illnesses and staff shortages create what health leaders describe as "unacceptable delays" for patients. The move by Nottingham University Hospitals (NUH) and Sherwood Forest Hospitals NHS Trusts comes as emergency departments are overwhelmed, with one facility treating over 500 patients a day despite being built for just 350.
Unprecedented Pressure on Emergency Services
The declarations, made on 14 January 2026, are a direct response to what the trusts call "severe and sustained pressure" across all their sites. This official status allows health chiefs to prioritise dwindling resources and enact emergency measures, as demand dramatically outstrips available capacity. The situation is particularly acute at the Queen's Medical Centre in Nottingham, part of NUH, which is experiencing a 43% spike in daily emergency department attendance.
This has resulted in patients facing exceptionally long waits, often in hospital corridors, as staff struggle to cope. Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust explicitly cited a combination of rising winter infections, high staff sickness rates, and significant difficulties in discharging patients as the core drivers of the crisis. Many patients are medically fit to leave but cannot be discharged due to a lack of available social care, creating a critical bottleneck that prevents new admissions from accessing beds.
Emergency Measures and Public Plea
In response to the escalating situation, the trusts have implemented a series of drastic measures to maintain patient safety. These include:
- Postponing some non-urgent elective procedures.
- Redeploying staff to frontline roles in emergency and critical care.
- Suspending all non-essential activities to focus entirely on the most critically ill.
Health leaders have issued a stark plea to the public, urging people to only attend Accident and Emergency (A&E) departments for genuine, life-threatening emergencies. Those with less urgent conditions are warned they will face extreme waiting times and are advised to seek help from pharmacies, GP services, or NHS 111 instead.
A National Picture of Strain
The crisis in Nottinghamshire is not an isolated event. These latest critical incident declarations follow similar emergency measures taken by four other NHS trusts across southeast England, the Midlands, and parts of Wales in recent days. The widespread nature of these incidents underlines the extreme national strain currently facing the entire NHS network during a particularly challenging winter period.
The affected trusts in the East Midlands are major providers: Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust runs both Nottingham City Hospital and Queen's Medical Centre. Sherwood Forest Hospitals NHS Trust operates King's Mill Hospital in Sutton-in-Ashfield and Newark Hospital. Their simultaneous move to critical status highlights the scale of the challenge engulfing healthcare services in the region and beyond.
