NHS Fife has apologised for keeping patients waiting too long for emergency treatment.
Chief executive George Brechin expressed regret after new figures laid bare the problems swamping region’s accident and emergency services.
Government statistics published on Tuesday showed a sharp drop in the number of patients being seen within the four-hour target of arriving at hospital.
Last November 92.5% of patients were treated within the timescale, but the figure had dropped to 83.7% the following month. That was just weeks before all A&E services at the Queen Margaret Hospital in Dunfermline were switched to a new wing at Kirkcaldy’s Victoria Hospital.
Labour said the statistics showed the problems could not simply be blamed on the switch of location.
Mr Brechin insisted he is confident the situation will improve as staff get used to working procedures in Kirkcaldy.
”We are sorry that patients are waiting too long in our A&E department,” he said. ”While our clinical staff are working exceptionally hard, we know we need to improve our systems of working.
”We have planned a number of changes as part of the move of services from Dunfermline to Kirkcaldy. We expect our performance against the four-hour target to improve over the coming weeks.”
In recent weeks The Courier has been inundated with claims of overworked nurses and patients left on trolleys in corridors for up to 14 hours since the new wing at Victoria opened last month.
NHS Fife operational division chief executive John Wilson acknowledged the pressure staff are under at the £170 million hospital wing.
Mr Wilson, who takes over from Mr Brechin in April, said the ”teething problems” had been caused by staff having to adjust to different ways of working and get used to the bigger building.
Mid Scotland and Fife MSP Dr Richard Simpson said he suspects the problems are caused by staff shortages.
Difficulties in drawing up doctors’ rotas for the two sites and restrictions on hiring locums from abroad led to the health board temporarily downgrading A&E provision overnight on several occasions in 2010.
”This drop is very concerning,” said Dr Simpson, Labour’s deputy health spokesman. ”The proper target of 95% was already not being met previously in any case.”
A spokeswoman for the Scottish Government said officials are working with NHS Fife to improve the situation.
She said: ”Our aim is to have as many people as possible treated within four hours of their admission to accident and emergency and although the vast majority are, we are continuing work to improve this figure in some areas.”
Other figures showed NHS Fife still has a problem with bed blocking.
There were 64 delayed discharges in Fife last month the highest percentage of patients in mainland Scotland, but an improvement on the 156 figure from 2011.
The problem occurs when patients are unable to leave hospital because they are waiting for care to be arranged.
Fife Labour leader Councillor Alex Rowley said: ”These figures serve to underline that we need a complete overhaul of health and social care services in Fife.”