Hospitals in England will miss the A&E waiting time target for the year for the first time ever.
The Department of Health has admitted that repeated failure to meet the target of 95% of patients waiting four hours or less means it is no longer possible for the NHS to meet the standard for the whole of 2014/15.
The target was missed for the 23rd week in a row last week.
Annual figures for Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust – which runs HRI and CRH – are not yet available.
The trust met the 95% target for the first six months of 2014/15 but missed it by 2% in quarter three.
The figures in quarter four so far have fluctuated above and below the target.
The trust recorded its worst A&E waiting results in more than a decade in January but recovered to meet the target in February.
During the week ending January 4 only 84.5% of people attending were seen within four hours – more than 10% below the NHS target .
That week 164 patients waited between four and 12 hours – almost 24 per day.
Last week the trust just missed the 95% target by half a point with only 20 people waiting more than four hours.
Dr Sarah Pinto-Duschinksy, director of operations and delivery for NHS England, said staff had “pulled out all the stops” to provide “incredible” care for record levels of patients.
She said: “These record numbers - up by between 6% and 9% some weeks - mean that although the NHS won’t have met the A&E average 95% target for the full year, staff continued even during this busiest winter ever to treat more than nine in ten people within four hours.
“And most patients were, in fact, treated in under an hour.
“This is not only the best performance in the UK but probably of any major country internationally.
“These winter pressures underline the importance of the wider work under way as part of the NHS Urgent and Emergency Care Review which will deliver care in a more integrated way, better helping people get the right treatment, at the right time and in the right place.”
