The NHS body which supervises healthcare trusts, Monitor, has closed its investigation into A&E waits at the Royal Berks. The investigation was opened last August after the Royal Berks A&E department had breached the target for 95% of attendees to be seen within 4-hours three times in 21 months. Investigators were satisfied with the Royal Berks' measures to improve the situation. These include an expansion providing eight new bays in the A&E department. Paul Streat, regional director at Monitor, said: We have looked very closely at how this trust is being run and we have decided that its management is taking the necessary steps to improve its performance for patients." Not only are more people attending the Royal Berkshire Hospital's A&E department, but their problems are more serious ones. At the last hospital board meeting Dr Sue Edees, urgent care director, highlighted the fact that the percentage of patients being treated for major conditions in the emergency department has risen by 30 per cent to 65 per cent in the last 12 months.