| Now and again it’s great to be able to say we have scored a bit of a win, so I am delighted to say that proposals to effectively remove Orthopaedic in-patient services (hips, joints etc) from Ealing Hospital have been dropped and we are being thanked by doctors for bringing it about! – Please read on for more on this news. |
| Also in the Newsletter there are some great photos of families supporting our campaign to bring back Urology, Maternity & Childrens Acute Services to Ealing as well as some other interesting NHS news. |
| Orthopaedic Cuts at Ealing Hospital shelved: |
| We recently received disturbing reports from Consultants that there were plans by some managers to move Orthopaedic services from Ealing to Northwick Park Hospital. Initially we were told it would be night-time trauma surgery (emergencies) from 8pm – 8am, but later on, we heard this was to be extended so that all Orthopaedic trauma patients, requiring a stay in hospital would be transferred to Northwick Park (NPH) direct from Ealing’s A&E Department, regardless of what time they arrived. Thus making Ealing Hospital merely a ‘stabilise and transfer service’ with no Orthopaedic In-Patients at all! |
| On 21st June, we had a pre-arranged meeting with the London North West NHS Trust Chief Executive, Jacqueline Docherty & Trust Chair, Peter Worthington, who are responsible for Ealing Hospital. Although we did not know the full extent of the proposed cuts at that time, we were able to raise our concerns about the impact of reducing Orthopaedic surgery at Ealing, in particular, how it would further undermine the A&E and the Hospital and seriously affect local people if forced to travel to Northwick Park. |
| The Chief Executive told us they were not aware of these plans, which she said would have to be agreed at Senior Management level. However the plans still seemed to be progressing until last Wednesday when the Consultants, who have been collectively resisting these cuts, were formally told that :- |
| “Ealing Save Our NHS (ESON) had gained knowledge of the proposed plan and had raised concerns to the Chief Exec and Chair, who in response had recommended the proposed plans be withdrawn” – It is really nice to know we are seen as a force to be taken seriously! |
| Also great that joint action by Hospital Consultants and ESON was so effective – let’s keep it up to stop further cuts and hopefully get some of our lost services restored. |
| Didn’t we have a lovely time at Norwood Green Village Day: |
| Our last Stall of the Summer was at the lovely Norwood Green Village Day in Southall in mid- July. |
| We had a fantastic response from everyone who visited our Stall, as you will see from our lovely pictures – both big and small! Local MP Virendra Sharma signed the petition as did the Deputy Mayor and some Councillors and we collected 200 signatures for our petition – ‘Bring back Vital services to Ealing Hospital’. Big thanks to Norwood Green Residents Association who once again were very supportive. |
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If you have not signed our PETITION, please do so here |
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| Hot off the press – ‘Millions wasted in failed NHS closure programme’. |
| Readers of our Newsletter will be familiar with the scandalous waste of money, spent on the ‘Shaping a Healthier Future’ programme which had at its heart the closing of Ealing & Charing Cross Hospitals A&E and hundreds of beds. NHS bosses in North West London have been keen to sweep their mistakes under the carpet but a recent leaked internal document on ‘how to reply to SaHF questions’ reveals how little was achieved considering the £76 million + that was just spent on management consultants. |
| The big plan to reduce the number of beds by treating people in the community resulted in a meagre reduction of only 7 beds! They now accept that in fact they will need more beds. Certainly time for a proper independent inquiry in to what went wrong and why so much public money was wasted. |
| You can read the full story here – |
| Plans for a Major North West London NHS Re-organisation – a threat to local needs: |
| Health campaigners across North West London are very concerned about plans by NHS North West London to centralise decision making about how NHS money is spent locally and what services are provided. Currently such decisions are made by Borough based Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs), in Ealing its Ealing CCG. All this is set to change possibly as early as April next year. |
| This major re-organisation follows on from the failed ‘Shaping a Healthier Future’ |
| (SHAF) Programme, without any lessons being learnt at all, so it does not bode well. |
| The eight Borough based CCGs in North West London are to be replaced with a single North West London CCG whose main role will be to commission health services for all of the 8 London Boroughs. However there are huge variations in health, deprivation and life expectancy, so it is hard to see how centralisation won’t lead to local needs not being addressed and deprived areas losing out. |
| New local structures are to be set up – called local’ integrated care partnerships’ made up of Hospital Trusts, Community Health providers and Councils who are supposed to feed in to the new North West London CCG along with GPs via their new Primary Care Networks (another recent re-structure) |
| We think it is reasonable that those who take decisions about the health needs of our local community should be accountable and open to public scrutiny here in Ealing, but we have no real confidence this will happen without a fight. Most local authorities also share the concerns of campaigners. |
| We are currently producing detailed comments on the implications for local people – so please watch this space. |
| Simon Stevens doing a re-think on removing nursing bursaries?: |
| It seems the crisis in recruiting nurses is beginning to hit home at last, judging by NHS England boss, Simon Stevens’s latest comments at a Kings Fund conference. |
| “There has been a big debate about bursaries and their removal, which as we look at the way the student loan system is working, that is clearly back in play as a big question we’ve got to answer as a nation.” |
| It didn’t take a genius to work out that removing bursaries and replacing them with loans would discourage potential nurses, (who wants to build up huge debts) but no doubt some NHS Bureaucrat was paid lots of our money to come up with the Plan! |
| Urgent Care Cuts across NW London but H&F Hubs stay for now: |
| Hammersmith & Fulham NHS bosses (H&F Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) have voted to close Hammersmith Urgent Care Centre (UCC) overnight as part of a £21m cuts package. This follows plans for a similar cut in hours at Central Middlesex Hospital UCC, a reduction in medical cover at St Charles UCC plus the threatened closure of Cricklewood Walk-In Centre. Inevitably long A&E waits are going to get even longer. However plans to slash GP Hubs (which organise out of hours GP medical care) from 3 to 1 in H&F have been postponed until April 2020. This gives local campaigners more time to make the case for adequate community health provision. |
| Extending UCC’s to cover 24 hours, 7 days was supposed to be an ‘achievement’ of the abandoned SaHF, but even that is being reversed. Thanks to Anne Drinkel of Hammersmith & Fulham Save Our NHS for the story. |
| Ealing Hospital OPEN DAY – This Saturday 27th July from 11.00-2.00 pm. A good opportunity to chat to hospital staff and show some support, with possibly some fun thrown in. Link here |
| Our next campaign meeting will be Tuesday 17th September. We don’t have a date for our next Street Stall, so a bit nearer the time I will check out availability for either 14th or 21st September |
| Mental Health Summit – 28th September: |
| 10.00 – 5.00 pm in the Royal Free Hospital, London, hosted by KONP, Health Campaigns Together and Mental Health Time for Action. It look like one not to miss if you are interested in Mental health. |
| Link to tickets and video here– |
| 40th Anniversary Celebration of Ealing Hospital – 5th November! |
| We hope to see some sparks on 5th November as we celebrate the 40th Birthday of Ealing Hospital, which was opened on 5th November 1979. It is early days yet for our plans, but definitely one for the diary, as it’s a great opportunity to raise the profile of the Hospital and our campaign to defend and restore hospital. |
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