The South Yorkshire ICB commissioned study of 236,741 patients from across four hospitals between 2021 and 2024 was supported by Health Data Research UK and the Yorkshire and Humber NHS Secure Data Environment (SDE).

Professor Suzanne Mason, SDE senior research lead, said: ‘To our knowledge, this is the first time anyone has been able to look at virtual ward data in this way.'

The report suggested the scale of virtual ward services may have been too small to produce a detectable impact across the wider hospital system.

A closer analysis of individual patients from three of the hospitals involved revealed patients receiving virtual ward care generally experienced significantly longer periods of care, compared to hospital inpatients.

Readmissions were also a ‘rare' event for virtual ward patients, but frailty virtual ward patients were also more likely to go to A&E or be readmitted to hospital within seven days of discharge from the virtual ward. In comparison inpatient spells that were followed by a readmission were more likely to involve chains of multiple readmissions.

Professor Mason stressed limitations in data quality, availability and consistency due to the gradual nature of the introduction of virtual wards, means the results should be interpreted cautiously.

‘Better data collection and harmonisation between hospital and virtual wards is needed to fully understand the impact of virtual wards,' she said.

‘We are now looking at the cost effectiveness of the initiative as a new piece of work going forward.'

Dr David Crichton, chief medical officer at NHS South Yorkshire, said: ‘The analysis provides an overview of progress and activity during the first 18 months of virtual ward mobilisation. The ICB supports the continued development and expansion of virtual wards as a tool to prevent avoidable admissions into hospital (step up) or support early discharge out of hospital (step down). This needs to be tailored to the communities that we serve.'