Has Scarborough NHS Trust pulled the plug on Bridlington???


This is the Television interview/statement that Interim Chief Executive Iain McInnes gave on Monday to Yorkshire television;

it was said:

The hospital is not well catered to cope with medical emergencies of that kind of nature. There is an ambulance service, the 999 service, and we would normally expect patients to use that. On the rare occasions when patients do present here, we will do what we can to support them but they would need a 999 ambulance and will be transferred elsewhere.

My point is that Bridlington hospital has a CMU which does the same acute work as CCU at Scarborough so why is the hospital not "catered to cope" with chest pain admissions? If a patient calls an ambulance from the hospital car park, why does the ambulance have to take the patient to Scarborough ?

Writes Mick Pilling....This is nothing but a blatant lie...Bridlington can cope and has done so in the past

Has the Scarborough NHS Healthcare Trust made up its mind??? read-on:

Turnaround Times - Issue 5 Issue 5-
Monday 16 October 2006

Welcome to the fifth edition of "Turnaround Times", which aims to keep you updated specifically on issues related to the trust's developing plans for resolving our financial deficit position.  If you have any suggestions of how we can improve the newssheet, or any questions you wish to see answered in a future issue, please contact Iain McInnes , Interim Chief Executive, by email or through Isy Galavan .

New issue date... Following the issue of last week's Turnaround Times being a day late I have received comments that some staff felt that Monday was a better day to receive it. So, Monday is the future day for issuing Turnaround Times.

Meeting with the Strategic Health Authority.... A meeting with the SHA will be held within the next two to three weeks to discuss the Turnaround Plan in detail. This meeting is likely to involve both the SHA and representatives from the Department of Health. Secretary of State, Patricia Hewitt, is visiting Harrogate on Wednesday 18 th October and I have been invited along with other CE colleagues to meet with her at the end of the day. I will report back on any national messages she may put forward. A clear position statement on community hospitals would be particularly useful to us locally.

Turnaround and Community Hospitals at Malton and Whitby Some staff suggested that we should withdraw ser­vices from community hospitals in Malton and Whitby . We have been assessing the level of out patient and theatre work at Malton and Whitby Hospitals over the last 12 months. In addition we have also looked at the number and range of referrals from Malton and Whitby GPs to services at Scarborough Hospital . Given the current level of referrals at Malton and Whitby ; and the potential risk that patients and GPs may opt to go elsewhere for their secondary care if we withdrew from these sites it does not make business sense to withdraw. We could make a small saving by withdrawing but the risk is that we could lose a significant amount of income if patients and GPs reacted by going elsewhere for secondary care.

Bridlington Hospital Similarly there have been suggestions that we should withdraw from the Bridlington site or seek to sell/transfer the site. We are currently discussing with the East Yorkshire PCT a future role for the Bridlington Hospital . From our perspective we are seeking to:

  • better integrate Minor Injuries services with Primary care services & GP Out of Hours ·
  • extend/expand day case surgical work on the site
  • work with the PCT to deliver a service for medical and elderly patients that meets the needs of the local population.

It is probable that Bridlington Hospital site will provide a range of both community led and secondary care led services, delivered side by side in an integrated manner wherever possible. When discussions with the PCT are completed we will be going out to full public consultation on the future role of Bridlington Hospital . We are currently working towards public consultation from December 2006 to March 2007.

Staff meetings... I had the benefit of spending a whole day looking at maternity services last week. It was time very well spent in learning about, and understanding the issues in delivering maternity care in a rural setting. It was very encouraging to meet the very dedicated and highly professional midwifery teams that work out in our rural patches.   This was augmented by a brief visit to the Scarborough Hospital Maternity Unit. Helen Geraughty took the opportunity to ensure I was fully briefed on maternity services and midwifery issues. I am meeting the Bridlington midwives this week and the Scarborough team after the half term.

My night duty visit was also very interesting, although I only managed 9pm to 1am so not a full shift (but I was back at my desk at 8.30am the next morning). The hospital is a very different place at night and can produce some very different challenges.

Meeting a mixture of permanent night staff and staff on internal rotation also meant I could have a more in depth chat about the needs of some of the patients we care for in the hospital; especially the medical patients and how for some of them their care needs would be better met outside of the hospital.

Thank you again for your continued support

SEPTEMBER S TRUST BOARD

The September meeting of the Trust Board was held on 26th September at Scarborough Hospital, following the Annual
General Meeting. The following topics were discussed:

  • Interim Chief Executive Iain McInnes drew attention to the importance of reducing waiting times for diagnostics: from 30/4/07 patients waiting for most imaging scans must be seen within 13 weeks or be offered the scan at another provider.
  • By March 2008, all diagnostic tests should be performed within six weeks.
  • Interim Director of Finance Martin Robson explained that the trust has overspent its budget by £2.7M for the first 5 months of its operation. The effect of this year s deficit and those for the prior two years are causing a £9.4M cash shortfall. Our capital programme, however remains within budget.
  • The forecast end of year overspend stands at £9m. This is partly attributable to some £3.1m reduction in income budgets from the PCTs, £1.2m adjustment because of prior years deficits, (the strategic health authority having allocated 90% of the total from its own central reserves as interim support) and turnaround costs of £500,000. Martin made it clear the this is an unacceptable position: the existing budget and report structures are being re-examined, and a revised budget, including recovery schemes, will be presented to the October 2006 Board Meeting.

Deputy Director of Planning, Performance and Information Tim Watts presented the performance report. He explained
that activity levels this year have decreased, and we are looking for the reasons behind this. We have achieved the national standard waiting times for both inpatients and outpatients, but missed the cancer diagnosis to treatment
target of 98% by 2%. We did, however, meet the 2 week target and the urgent referral to treatment target. A&E performance continues to be very good, and we are set to achieve the quarter 2 target at the end of this month, attending 98% of patients within 4 hours.

Medical Director Ian Holland spoke particularly about risk management which is, as he said, everybodys responsibility
. The trust is adopting the key principles defined by the Healthcare Commission: to ensure workers and the public are properly protected; to provide benefit to society by balancing benefits and risks; to enable innovation and learning; to ensure that those who create risks manage them responsibly; and to enable individuals to understand that as well as
a right to protection, they have to exercise responsibility. Ian also reported that we continue to be the best-performing
trust within our cancer network, with good performance against the two week wait and 31 day targets. Some areas within the 62 day target need improvement, however.


Director of Nursing Marian Pearson reported on the progress of the senior nursing re-structure. This will see the nurse manager and modern matron posts replaced by seven matron managers , reporting to the Deputy Chief Nurse. She also reported on the changes within Outpatients which will introduce a revised skill mix. In both theses cases, nurses not allocated roles within the new structures will be redeployed elsewhere within the trust.


Director of HR Duncan Henderson reported on a number of changes within NHS HR nationally, including arrangements for retirement, redundancies, and new equality legislation - including age discrimination, which came into effect yesterday. A wealth of information can be found about all these on the internet: go to nhsemployers.org .


In Facilities, the Procure 21 project incorporating new theatres and endoscopy is progressing well, and the building is now safely watertight in time for winter, during which the internal work will continue. The upgrade to the Shepherd operating theatre in Bridlington is now complete, and the first patients have been through the refurbished facility.
Formal approval has also been given to upgrade the pharmacy department s aseptic suite: it is hoped that the work will begin next month and be complete by the end of February next year.


Turnaround Director Tony Thomas reported that, although there has not yet been the opportunity to demonstrate tangible results, significant progress has been made in defining the shape, organisation and deliverables of the overall turnaround initiative. The real turnaround engagement is, therefore, about to start.


Papers were presented on Good Doctors, Safe Patients and EWTD 2009. Policies/documents were approved on: The Management and Disposal of Confidential Waste; Security Management; Being Open; Bomb Alerts; Trust Induction; Procedure for the Investigation and Root Cause Analysis of Incidents, Complaints and Claims; Procedure and Guidance on Confined Space Working; and Policy and Procedure for the Management of Claims.


Finally, Interim Chief Exec Iain McInnes presented an update on the turnaround plan. He described the key health challenges as: Providing a wide and complex range of clinical and support services to fully support a 24 hour A&E Department; Maintaining and further developing strategic alliances with larger acute trusts to ensure a robust care pathway for patients who require specialist and tertiary services; Care for the growing number of dependent older people; Delivering appropriate health services, meeting the needs of local patients in a clinically safe and affordable way through a range of community hospitals and other health care premises; and managing the unscheduled care demand agenda.

Key messages include:

  • An essential foundation for service redesign and future investment choices is robust financial health;
  • Financial recovery can be achieved but communicating and delivering the plan will be a challenging task;

We are all in this together - the problem impacts upon us all and everyone needs to take action to solve the problem; Clinical involvement is essential in the development of plans.

Papers for the Trust Board can be found on the Trust s website:
go to http://www.scarborough.nhs.uk/trust_documents.php 12th October 2006

HOW OTHER LOCAL TRUSTS DID:
Trust performances, with service ratings followed by use of resources rating:

  • East Yorkshire PCT Good/Fair;
  • Humber Mental Health Fair/Fair;
  • Hull and East Yorkshire Hospitals Fair/Weak;
  • West Hull PCT Good/Good; Eastern Hull PCT Fair/ Good;
  • Yorkshire Wolds and Coast PCT Fair/Weak;
  • Scarborough Whitby Ryedale PCT Fair/Weak;
  • York Hospitals Good/Fair;
  • Harrogate Foundation Trust Excellent/ Excellent.

Are there any stories you d like to see either in Updates or in the local media? Please contact Gilly Collinson or Chris Coombs in Trust HQ.

You will find a printable version of this Update in the everyone folder, or see under news at www.scarborough.nhs.uk

TRUST JUDGED FAIR IN NEW RATINGS

Finances and targets hinder overall score In the new system of annual performance ratings published today by the Healthcare Commission, this trust has been judged fair for the quality of its services but weak for its use of resources during the year April 2005 to March 2006.

Said our Interim Chief Executive Iain McInnes,
The new performance ratings cover a much broader area than the previous star rating system. There is some very fine work going on here in Scarborough and Bridlington, which is reflected in the detail of the assessment and recognised in our rating as fair . It will come as no surprise to anyone that, with regard to the use of resources, we have been categorised as weak , because that reflects the Trust s well-known financial challenges.

Work to address this is well underway. In respect of quality of care, having achieved nine out of the twelve targets we partly met the existing national targets. The three targets we did not achieve are: rapid access chest pain clinics, re-admissions after cancelled operations, and 60-minute call to needle time for thrombolysis - which is always going to be a difficult target in such a rural area.

However, some of our scores were excellent. We were, for example, one of only 59% of trusts who met the target for treating all cancers within two months of an urgent GP referral. That signifies a high quality service to patients at a time when it matters most.

We scored as good for the new national targets. We were amongst only 53% of trusts which achieved the target for reducing MRSA; we have processes for managing obesity; we meet guidelines for treating those who have selfharmed;
and we have made good progress in supporting a smoke-free NHS. All these are tangible things that matter to our patients. In particular, the results of our 2005 patient survey were deemed satisfactory, which is very pleasing.

We were also judged good on our admissions management, with emergency access through A&E rated particularly
well. Again a significant number of hospitals elsewhere had difficulty achieving this.

Overall, there is no doubt that there is room for improvement in a number of areas. But clearly we have a good foundation to build on for services for local people. Given the attention that is already being focussed on addressing our
finances, I believe that we can be quietly optimistic about the likelihood of improving this rating in future years.

Full details can be found on the Healthcare Commission website: www.healthcarecommission.org.uk

The Annual Healthcheck nationally:

570 NHS bodies were assessed: Hospitals, ambulance trusts, primary care trusts and mental health trusts. Each was judged on quality of services and financial management and ranked in each as excellent, good, fair or weak. 78 of the
570 were weak on services, 210 were weak on finance. 24 were excellent on services, 19 were excellent on finance. Only Harrogate and the Royal Marsden achieved excellent on both.

 
back