Bronglais Hospital slowed its overspending during November after cutting the amount of money spent on agency and locums.

Figures released by the Wales Audit Office for the 2017/18 financial year showed that Hywel Dda Health Board had the second highest spending on agency and locum staff of all Welsh health boards at £24.8m.

But figures from November showed that Bronglais had showed a “slightly improved overspend” in November after managing to reduce the reliance on agency staff.

A report that went before the health board’s January meeting said: “Bronglais General Hospital reported a slightly improved overspend to Month 8, predominantly due to nursing agency and medical locums pay costs, resulting from fewer agency shifts and locum recruitment.”

Despite the improvement, the report says that Bronglais still overspent in November, but that is part of overspending across the entire health board that is expected to reach £35.5m at the end of the financial year.

That would have been a massive £62.5m, but additional funding of £27m helped ease that situation.

While Bronglais managed to reduce the reliance on agency and locum staff, issues with staff recruitment are still major concerns across the Hywel Dda area and across Wales as a whole.

Meanwhile, following the WAO report into agency staff spending, Montgomeryshire AM Russell George warned that continuing problems with staff recruitment and the reliance on agency staff was proving to be a major concern for the Welsh NHS.

Across Wales a total of £135.7m was spent on agency staff in 2017/18.

Hywel Dda had the joint highest proportion of total spend on agency staff at 6.2 per cent, alongside Powys and Cwm Taf.

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