Reduced hours at the Lamb Foggo Urgent Care Centre will be in place until at least the end of the month, a Bermuda Hospitals Board spokeswoman said.

The UCC in St David’s will be open for evenings only on week days.

It follows a step taken in January to help make sure that there is enough staff at the King Edward VII Memorial Hospital’s emergency department.

A BHB spokeswoman said that the situation will be reassessed at the end of the month.

She added: “The UCC is currently open from 6pm to 10pm Monday to Friday and 9am to 9pm on Saturday and Sunday.”

Dr Chikezie Dean Okereke, the BHB’s chief of emergency, said: “The temporary change in the weekday hours implemented last month has helped.

“As we remain under the same pressures the decision was made today to extend the current hours until the end of this month.”

Judy Richardson, the chief of nursing, added: “The reduced UCC hours allow us to redeploy a full time nurse back to the ED which assists in delivering care where the most unwell people are in need.”

Dr Okereke said in January that “a number of factors” led to the change.

He added that these included “staffing issues, with some existing vacant positions and Covid-19 quarantine absences”.

Dr Okereke said then: “We are extremely busy in the main emergency department at the moment.

“We are seeing many very unwell patients who need admission. This is not primarily driven by Covid-19 infections, but pre-existing medical conditions.

“We are struggling to get patients discharged in a timely manner from inpatient units, as they need community services, nursing home placements or family support.

“This has resulted in an increasing number of people waiting in the emergency department following admission, delays in timely assessment and management of the new patients attending and a high overall number of patients in the ED needing care.”