Senior emergency doctors at Scotland's biggest hospital have warned the healthcare watchdog that patients are being harmed by delays to care, describing the risk of "uncontrollable system failure" in the emergency department.

The warning came in a letter from consultants at the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital (QEUH) in Glasgow to Healthcare Improvement Scotland (HIS), sent in July and reported on Monday, 9 November 2026. The doctors said conditions in the emergency department had deteriorated since the watchdog's last review of the hospital.

A warning sent in July

The consultants' letter was sent to HIS in July. It warned that the emergency department was struggling with sustained overcapacity and that there was no effective strategy in place to address the problems.

The doctors said evidence now clearly linked overcrowding in accident and emergency areas to higher death rates. Their letter is the latest sign of strain at the Glasgow hospital, which is the largest in Scotland.

Conditions worse since the last review

The doctors said the situation had deteriorated since HIS last reviewed the hospital. That review was undertaken in 2024 and published a year later.

The earlier report found that poor relationships between managers and consultants were likely to have had a detrimental impact on patient care. The July letter suggests those problems have not been resolved, and that the pressure on the emergency department has grown worse.

Patients moved into corridors

According to the letter, staff were being forced to step down patients from resuscitation areas and move people into corridors to cope with the numbers arriving at the department.

Resuscitation areas are reserved for the most seriously ill patients, so moving people out of them is a sign of how stretched the department has become. The consultants said the overcrowding was sustained rather than a short-lived surge.

The official response

Healthcare Improvement Scotland said it continued to follow up its earlier review. A spokesperson said the watchdog would be meeting frontline staff and reviewing progress against the recommendations from its previous review during November.

NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde, the health board that runs the hospital, said it continued to address the issues raised in the letter. Health Secretary Angela Constance said she was aware of the concerns raised by emergency department staff and agreed that current accident and emergency waiting times were not acceptable.

The Scottish Liberal Democrats called on ministers to act on the letter, saying the warning from senior doctors could not be ignored.

Wider questions about the hospital

The letter has also revived debate about how the hospital is run. The health board is currently subject to a full public inquiry over deaths related to the QEUH, and the prosecution service is investigating seven deaths, according to a briefing published on Monday by the think tank Common Weal.

The same briefing noted that a previous health secretary had created a specialist oversight body for the board after the watchdog's damning report. The Scottish Government has described the emergency department problems as an operational matter for the health board.

For patients and staff, the immediate question is whether the watchdog's follow-up work in November produces visible change in a department the consultants say is already failing to cope.