Up to one in three English hospital beds occupied by patients fit for discharge

Exclusive: Acute lack of social care means people are not able to leave, often causing their health to worsen

• A doctor told me I could be here for months': patients stuck in England's hospitals

As many as one in three hospital beds in parts of England are occupied by patients who are well enough to be discharged, with a chronic lack of social care meaning many do not have suitable places to go.

Guardian analysis of official data shows that on average 13,600 beds across NHS England are occupied every day with patients who doctors say are medically fit to go home or to a care home, equivalent to one in seven beds in acute hospitals in October.