The north’s flagship hospital was on “red alert” last night as operations were cancelled because of a lack of beds.
Planned surgery and day case procedures at Raigmore in Inverness were postponed to try to ease the pressure caused by a flood of winter-related emergencies.
The crisis unfolded as Health Secretary Shona Robison announced NHS Highland would receive an additional £9.4million from the Scottish Government this year.
But a north politician claimed the cash injection had arrived too late to allow the health board to avoid the “red alert” situation and save patients from the anguish and inconvenience of having to wait longer for surgery.
Highlands and Islands Conservative MSP Mary Scanlon said: “NHS Highland has been forced to make these very difficult decisions due to the lack of funding over many years by the Scottish Government.
“This has been addressed by the announcement of additional funding, but not in time for them to get more resources in place to plan for these winter emergencies.
“Had the additional funding been made available earlier, NHS Highland and patients in Highland would have been in a far better position today.”
Highland and Islands Independent MSP Jean Urquhart, said: “It is always frustrating when operations have to be cancelled for whatever reason, but lack of beds seems to be one of the worst reasons.
“If we have the staff and the operating theatres available, providing enough beds should be the easiest part to achieve.”
She said canceling operations at short notice was particularly difficult for patients from outlying areas.
“Going into hospital involves a huge amount of planning, especially for people like farmers and crofters who have to arrange for their livestock to be cared for and it is not always possible for them to reschedule,” she said.
Ms Urquhart added that MSPs held regular meetings with the health board and she said the bed situation would be discussed as a matter of urgency at the next meeting.
Raigmore Hospital has about 400 beds, including 22 “winter” ones that are only opened during the busy period.
The requirement for beds is regularly assessed and graded red, amber or green, depending on the pressure on those available. The current situation has been classified as red.
An NHS Highland spokeswoman said: “Raigmore Hospital is under pressure at the moment due a high number of emergency admissions.
“Our staff are working very hard to do what they can to minimise the effect on patients, but normal escalation procedures are in place.”
She explained that all elective surgery – operations scheduled in advance because they do not involve a medical emergency – was cancelled yesterday and patients were being sent home early where it was “safe and practical” to do so.
And she said regular “bed meetings” were being held throughout the day to enable managers to continually assess the situation.
She said: “We are also canceling elective and some day case activity on Tuesday and reviewing activity for the rest of the week.
“We understand that waiting for an operation is an anxious time and have apologised to the patients concerned and explained the situation.”
She added that about 10 planned operations were cancelled yesterday.
The spokeswoman added that 28 scheduled operations were cancelled last week for the same reason.