REVEALED: How Peterborough City Hospital is dealing with the 'winter crisis,' bed shortages and norovirus

Here's how North West Anglia NHS Foundation Trust coped in the week of January 29 to February 4.

BED OCCUPANCY

The trust's beds were 95.5% full on average, well above the recommended safe limit of 85%.

In hospitals where more than 85% of beds are occupied, there is a greater risk of patients receiving inadequate care, being placed on an inappropriate ward for their condition, or contracting superbugs such as MRSA, according to the British Medical Association.

Occupancy rates have largely stayed the same since the previous week's report.

Of 799 available beds, 763 were in use on average throughout the week.

Of these, 29 were 'escalation beds', temporary beds set up in periods of intense pressure. These are sometimes placed in areas not usually used for hospital patients, such as gyms or day care centres.

This number has increased since the previous week, when 25 escalation beds were in use.

Bed blocking, where a patient is well enough to be discharged but unable to leave because the next stage of their care has not been organised, contributes significantly to A&E delays.

Some 108 patients had spent at least three weeks in hospital, taking up 13.5% of all beds.

AMBULANCES

There were 883 arrivals by ambulance during the week.

The trust dealt with fewer emergency patients than last week, when there were 938 arrivals.

Of these, 149 waited between 30 minutes and an hour before they could be transferred to the emergency department.

This was higher than the previous week's figure of 145.

In addition, 103 patients waited longer than an hour.

This was lower than the previous week's figure of 145.

The Department of Health says ambulance crews should be able to hand patients over to A&E staff within the 15-minute target time. Failure to meet this target increases the risk to patients and can delay ambulances from attending other emergencies.

NOROVIRUS

The vomiting bug norovirus is placing additional strain on hospitals which are already struggling to find enough beds. The virus is highly contagious, so staff must close an entire ward where a patient is infected.

But in North West Anglia NHS Foundation Trust, no beds were closed due to norovirus.

The previous week 5 beds were closed due to the vomiting bug.