Court backlogs and delays in holding inquests are causing distress for bereaved families, it has been claimed.

In some cases, families wait months for inquests even to be administratively opened - let alone heard in full and concluded - at West London Coroner's Court in Fulham.

Surrey's court has also admitted being "extremely busy"

Coroners are required to complete an inquest within six months of the date on which the coroner is made aware of the death, or as soon as is "reasonably practicable", except in exceptional cases, for example where a jury is necessary or there are criminal charges pending.

But delays sometimes extend to a year or more before a death can be taken off the court's books.

A Kingston Hospital spokeswoman said: "Our local coroners’ court [West London] is experiencing significant delays in holding inquest hearings.

"They are working to address these delays, but regrettably some affect the families of patients treated at Kingston Hospital.

"The delays are not related to Kingston Hospital in any way and families have our sympathy for the distress this causes."

Senior coroner Chinyere Inyama declined to comment for this story.

But he told an inquest in April that he was "deeply embarrassed" by the length of time cases had been taking to appear in the coroner’s court.

Since Mr Inyama joined the court last November last year there has been almost a 75 per cent turnover in staff in the office. He said mismanagement had caused long delays in cases being heard and this was now being rectified.

He added: "For want of a better word, simple cases should not be taking a year and a half to come into the court and in future they will not."

Meanwhile at Woking Coroner's Court, based in Woking, there are indications of the same backlog with the court admitting it is "extremely busy".

Although inquests are meant to be opened "as soon as possible", which has often meant in the past a timelag of three or four working days at most, it took eight working days for an inquest to be opened into the death of a woman killed in a fatal collision in Worcester Park.