Trapped in care: Recognising and responding to frailty as a cause of delayed transfers of care

“Bedblocking” is a term many of us are familiar with. It refers to patients remaining in a hospital bed when they are medically fit to leave because they have nowhere to go or no social support to help them. Media reports refer to large numbers of patients being “trapped” in hospital when they do not need to be there, and compromising that service's ability to provide care to other patients (https://www.theguardian.com/society/2015/jan/07/-sp-bedblockers-worsening-nhs-hospitals-crisis). As a result, the media often refer to older people in this scenario as “bedblockers.”