2/3/2007
Letters
NHS reforms need more consultation and more timeI was interested to read the report under the headline ‘Cameron visits A&E amid closure plot claims’, on the visit by the Conservative Party leader and local MPs to the Royal Surrey County Hospital.
As a public governor for Rushmoor of Frimley Park Hospital, I know of no plot by Frimley Park to undermine the accident and emergency service at the Royal Surrey, whose chief executive Nick Moberly has also said he does not believe that there is such a plot.
Surrey Primary Care Trust (PCT) is currently examining how to improve NHS services so that they are best for patients and sustainable financially. My reservation is about the haste with which the NHS is due to be reconfigured locally.
There needs to be co-operation between consultants, doctors, nurses and ambulance personnel over the improvements in NHS services for patients. But there is bound to be widespread opposition to the downgrading of any general hospital that appears driven by the demand for financial savings to bring the budget of the NHS into balance this year and surplus in the next year.
It would therefore seem better to have a period of transition in which priority is given to service improvements and to set a more realistic timetable for achieving a balanced budget.
In addition, any Surrey PCT proposals to reconfigure NHS services in Surrey need to take into account Hampshire PCT proposals for Hampshire, so that the best NHS services are available to patients, wherever they live. That requires co-operation at the highest level between the PCTs.
One way of relieving the financial pressure on the NHS locally may be for Hampshire PCT to fund a minor injuries unit at the new 770-room Aldershot Centre for Health that is due to be opened next year. I have therefore written to request urgent consideration of that option to the chief executive of Hampshire PCT, Graham Cruddace.
Readers who support the case for the minor injuries unit should also write to Mr Cruddace at Regus House, Southampton International Business Park, George Curl Way, Southampton SO18 2RZ.
ALEX CRAWFORD
Cargate Avenue
Aldershot First printed in:
Aldershot News and Mail
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