Directed by the Critical Care Network Board, each health board is required to develop a long-term plan for both beds and workforce.
To facilitate this, a capacity working group has been established to continue the recommendations outlined by the Task and Finish group on critical care, which was published in 2019.
Recommendations were made to increase capacity in most health boards. The group will consider the service changes since the publication of the report, such as the impact of the pandemic, unit centralisation/reconfiguration, introduction of the post anaesthetic care units and respiratory high-care/non-invasive ventilation areas.
The requirement for critical care beds will be calculated by mathematical modelling to provide a more accurate method for estimating numbers of beds and will be determined by the hospital configuration rather than just population size. The number of critical care beds required will depend on the capacity and capability of the hospital concerned.