Latest figures show 99.5 per cent of people attending casualty have been seen within four hours, compared with a target of 98 per cent.

Jan Filochowski, chief executive at West Herts Hospitals NHS Trust, told a board meeting they were also making progress on operation waiting times.

"Since September we have been achieving the (A&E] target and over the last month or two exceeding it," he said.

"For the last three weeks we have been at 99.5 per cent – it's about the best in the country."

The board agreed to pass on its congratulations to the staff involved.

The meeting heard the trust was making progress on a new target coming into force in March to deal with patients, from referral to treatment, within 18 weeks.

Mr Filochowski said: "We're scything through those waits.

"We have doubled the percentage of patients seen within 18 weeks.

"Patients are being seen more quickly. We're making a huge improvement."

Currently 90 per cent of patients who do not need to be admitted are seen within 18 weeks – up from 70 per cent three months ago.

For those who do need to be admitted the figure has risen from 30 per cent to around 60 per cent over the same period.

The rate of cancelled operations has dropped from two per cent to one per cent for the last two weeks.

However, bed blocking remains a problem with around 30 patients at any one time unable to be discharged because intermediate community care is not available.