Driving A&E Efficiency with Cellma: A Connected Approach to Emergency Care
Table of Contents Help Others Discover – Click to Share! Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Table of Contents THE SCALE OF THE PRESSURE: July 2026 recorded around 2.5 million A&E attendances – the highest monthly level on record – while only 75.4% of patients were admitted, transferred or discharged within four hours. 2.5 million A&E attendances. 75.4% within 4 hours. 47,000 patients waiting over 12 hours for emergency admission. 1.58 million 4+ hour waits over 12 months. 829,675 ambulance incidents. 898,503 999 calls. 3,000+ patients a day receiving corridor care. The numbers, at a glance: Metric Figure A&E attendances (July 2026) 2.5m Patients seen within 4 hours 75.4% Patients waiting 12+ hrs for admission 47,000 4+ hour waits over 12 months 1.58m Ambulance incidents handled 829,675 999 calls received 898,503 Patients/day receiving corridor care 3,000+ These numbers capture the pressure facing NHS A&E departments. July 2026 recorded around 2.5 million A&E attendances, the highest monthly level on record, while only 75.4% of patients were admitted, transferred or discharged within four hours. Ambulance services handled 829,675 incidents during the month, while 999 calls reached 898,503. For patients, this pressure can mean longer waits, repeated questions, delayed test results, difficulty finding beds and fragmented handovers. For frontline teams, it can mean more time spent chasing information, updating systems and managing patient flow rather than treating patients. This is where a connected EPR, patient portal and NHS App integration become increasingly important to A&E efficiency. A&E Is Under Pressure. The Digital Response Has to Keep Up. The NHS 10 Year Health Plan sets out a clear direction: hospital to community, analogue to digital, and sickness to prevention. It also places the NHS App at the centre of the future digital front door, with a single patient record intended to give patients secure access to their health information from 2028. Cellma aligns with this direction by connecting clinical information, patient administration, diagnostics, communication, patient engagement and operational data within one digital ecosystem. Its acute care capabilities are designed around real-world hospital workflows, including patient flow, triage, investigations, admissions, transfers, discharge and escalation. For an A&E department, that matters because A&E efficiency is not simply about getting patients through the department faster. It is about making sure the right information reaches the right clinician at the right time. Why A&E Needs More Than an EPR An EPR that simply replaces paper notes is not enough for today’s emergency department. A&E teams work across multiple systems and services: GP records Ambulance services NHS 111 Diagnostics Pathology Radiology/PACS Pharmacy SDEC Inpatient wards Mental health services Community care Virtual wards Social care Patients and carers When these systems do not communicate, staff can end up switching screens, searching for results, repeating questions or manually entering information. That creates friction at exactly the point where time matters most. The NHS itself recognises the need for better digital support for triage, patient flow and discharge coordination, alongside expanded SDEC and co-located Urgent Treatment Centres. Cellma approaches this as a connected pathway rather than a collection of separate systems. One Patient. One Record. One Connected A&E Journey. Cellma brings together the core information required throughout the emergency care pathway. Digital Triage and Clinical Assessment At the front door, clinicians need a quick picture of who the patient is, why they are here and what needs attention first. Cellma can bring together: ✓ Registration and demographics ✓ Triage documentation ✓ Vital signs ✓ Clinical notes ✓ Previous history ✓ Allergies ✓ Medication information ✓ Risk scores ✓ Investigations ✓ Clinical alerts This gives clinicians a structured starting point rather than making them piece together information from different sources. Cellma also supports clinical decision-support tools and pathways, including NEWS2/SIRS for sepsis, FAST for stroke, HEART for chest pain and NICE head-injury guidance. The result is a more informed clinical assessment and stronger A&E efficiency without taking clinical judgement out of the hands of clinicians. Real-Time Patient Flow – Know Where the Pressure Is A&E pressure does not stop at triage. A patient may move from: Arrival → Triage → Assessment → SDEC → Diagnostics → Treatment → Admission → Ward → Discharge At every stage, teams need to know: Where is the patient? How long have they been waiting? Has a test been requested? Are results available? Is a bed required? Has a decision to admit been made? Is the patient suitable for SDEC? Is discharge possible? Where is the bottleneck? Cellma’s PAS and patient-flow capabilities provide real-time visibility of admissions, transfers, discharges, bed locations, waiting times and four-hour performance. That means operational teams can see where patients are getting stuck instead of discovering the problem after the waiting-time breach has already happened. Diagnostics Without the “Where’s the Result?” Chase In a busy A&E, waiting for information can become a clinical bottleneck. A patient may have: Bloods taken → CT requested → X-ray completed → ECG recorded → Results reviewed → Clinical decision made Cellma connects clinical records with laboratory and imaging systems, providing access to diagnostic information as part of the patient record. This reduces the need to chase results across systems and helps clinicians make decisions using the latest available information. For patients, that can mean fewer unnecessary delays. For staff, it means less time spent hunting for data. For the department, it supports better A&E efficiency. Interoperability: The Bit That Makes the Difference The NHS is not one system. It is an ecosystem of trusts, GPs, community services, diagnostics, pharmacies, ambulance services and national platforms. That makes interoperability critical. Cellma supports interoperability through technologies and standards including: HL7 FHIR Open APIs RESTful APIs DICOM SNOMED CT ICD-10 / ICD-11 dm+d GP Connect PDS SCR CIS2 EPS NHS e-RS Shared Care Records Laboratory and imaging integrations These capabilities support the movement of structured information between primary, secondary and community care. So when an A&E clinician needs information from another part of the NHS, the objective is not another disconnected data island. It is a connected patient journey. Bringing