Idiom
bed blocker
Meaning
An elderly hospitalized person who is too infirm to return home but not sufficiently ill to necessitate continued hospitalization, creating a situation in which his or her hospital stay is prolonged while authorities or relatives search for a suitable placement amid the scarce resources of nursing homes or other long-term care facilities.
Meaning adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Examples
“The hospital staff worried that the patient had become a bed blocker.”
“The doctor says the patient is now a bed blocker because no relatives can help.”
“Because the nursing home had no available rooms, the elderly patient remained a bed blocker for several weeks.”
“Social workers are trying to find a care home for the man so he does not remain a bed blocker during the busy winter season.”
“The local government needs more funding for housing to prevent healthy seniors from acting as a bed blocker in emergency wards.”
“The hospital administration struggled to manage the rising number of bed blockers, as the lack of social care facilities prevented timely patient discharges.”
Examples
simple
“The hospital staff worried that the patient had become a bed blocker.”
“The doctor says the patient is now a bed blocker because no relatives can help.”
contextual
“Because the nursing home had no available rooms, the elderly patient remained a bed blocker for several weeks.”
“Social workers are trying to find a care home for the man so he does not remain a bed blocker during the busy winter season.”
“The local government needs more funding for housing to prevent healthy seniors from acting as a bed blocker in emergency wards.”
complex
“The hospital administration struggled to manage the rising number of bed blockers, as the lack of social care facilities prevented timely patient discharges.”
Key words
Related idioms
- Updated