Patient waiting times rise at A&E Data for England from the NHS Information Centre shows the percentage of people spending more than four hours in emergency departments rose from 4 per cent of all attendances (600,000) in 2009/10 to 5.6 per cent (900,000) in 2010/11. And doctors have previously warned that they find themselves "fire-fighting" growing numbers. Dr John Heyworth, president of the College of Emergency Medicine, has said "patchy" out-of-hours GP care for patients is also contributing to a rise in the numbers seeking help from A&E. The busiest time for A&E arrivals is 10am on Monday mornings. Today's figures show there were 15.8 million unplanned attendances at A&E in 2010/11, up more than 700,000 on 2009/10 when there were 15.1 million. Overall, 57.4 per cent (9.3 million) of all attendances resulted in patients being discharged while 21.9 per cent (3.6 million) of all attendances were admitted into hospital.