A&E patients at Epsom and St Helier hospitals received treatment faster than anywhere else in London after the NHS trust pioneered a new approach to emergency care.

The trust implemented the policy, dubbed ‘patient flow’, after a winter vomiting bug put pressure on bed numbers in December 2015.

Read more: Epsom and St Helier run out of beds as winter vomiting bug puts NHS under pressure

Under the programme hospital leaders arrange ‘huddle’ meetings together at 9am, 11am and 3pm in order to assess patients on site.

Medically fit people are discharged to free up beds in acute emergency wards and inpatients are cared for on the right speciality ward for their condition as part of the system.

After it adopted the scheme the trust reached the NHS target for 2016/17 to treat 95 per cent of patients within four hours and was listed as the seventh-best at delivering emergency care in the country in January.

Caroline Landon, the chief operating officer at Epsom and St Helier hospitals, said: “Our A&E departments were busier than ever last year, seeing a record breaking 151,900 attendances.

“But thanks to hard work, innovation and the unwavering support of staff across our hospitals, we exceeded the standard expected of us, and treated or discharged more than 95 per cent of patients within four hours.

“That is a remarkable achievement, and I would like to take this opportunity to publicly thank every single member of staff who helped along the way.

“Achieving this standard is very much a team effort, and although we have to thank our nurses, doctors and support staff working on the frontline of our busy A&E departments, there are hundreds of staff working behind the scenes who also helped to make this possible.”