Hospital administrators face public in Stone

The administrators of the Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust faced the public in Stone last night as part of the consultation into their proposals for the future of hospital services for Mid Staffordshire.

Financial administrator Alan Bloom and clinical administrator Hugo Mascie-Taylor answered questions and explained their proposals to around 200 people at St Dominic’s Priory School.

The Trust Special Administrators’ draft report on the future of hospital services in Mid Staffordshire was published at the end of July. The headlines for Stafford Hospital are:

The trust that runs the hospital (the Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust) should be dissolved

Stafford Hospital should be run by the University Hospital of North Staffordshire (UHNS)

The report recommends that no babies be born at Stafford Hospital as soon as other hospitals are ready to take on the additional capacity, with consultant-led pre and post-natal care delivered in partnership with UHNS so local women can still attend appointments in Stafford

Stafford should keep its 14-hour-a-day A&E service, which has been in place since 2011

Stafford’s critical care unit should be downgraded and some emergency surgery lost

Seriously ill children should no longer be admitted to Stafford. They should instead go to UHNS

Stafford hospitals should gain some minor operations and more patients should be sent there to recover from complicated surgery

A “Frail Elderly Assessment service” should be introduced, which would mean different sources providing information on older people’s needs when they are referred to hospital

The consultation period runs until 1st October before Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt makes a final decision on the proposals by the end of the year. You can see their full report and take part in the consultation HERE.

Instead of addressing the audience directly at St Dominic’s last night, a video was shown where the administrators’ proposals were justified. In response to criticism from previous consultation events in Stafford and Cannock, the video had been shortened to around 15 minutes. Here’s the video:

Then it was over to the audience.

Here’s an audio recording of the full meeting. The three people on the panel were financial administrator Alan Bloom, clinical administrator Hugo Mascie-Taylor and the meeting chair, Yvonne Buckland from Engaging Communities Staffordshire. Some audience members identified themselves before speaking, while others did not.

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Hugo Mascie-Taylor attempted to downplay concerns over increased travel time to access specialist care, saying that specialist centres were now part of the NHS and nothing new as part of the proposals. He said: “If you have a heart attack now, you shouldn’t go to Stafford – that is happening now and is not part of this process. You should go to a hospital that has the best technology and skills in a given specialist area. The journey may be longer, but it’s still in patients’ best interests.”

Many people questioned this, however, citing delays on roads between Stafford and Stoke.

Stone town and borough councillor Mike Williamson asked what would happen if a case of Norovirus or C-Difficile closed wards at the University Hospital of North Staffordshire. Hugo Mascie-Taylor replied that the better practice is to effectively manage a large hospital during that situation than have “lots of small hospitals” dotted around.

Midwifery services were perhaps the most contentious issue of the night, with many audience members demanding to know why babies would not be born at Stafford Hospital under the proposals – and some calling for a midwifery-led unit at Stafford.

Hugo Mascie-Taylor said that they simply could not recommend this. He said: “Commissioners don’t want it; providers haven’t come forward to provide it; and we have an £8 million deficit.”

Town and borough councillor Jill Hood, who’s also the chair of Age Concern in the town, said that the proposals’ impact on vulnerable, elderly people would be great, and that there would be a real financial impact on families having to travel further to visit relatives after hospital treatment. Hugo Mascie-Taylor told the meeting that the compromise they were trying to reach was to get patients “back to a hospital in their locality” for recovery after operations at another hospital.

Stone MP Bill Cash said there were “a number of really serious problems” with the proposals that were still outstanding. He raised the issue of rural parts of his constituency and people’s difficulty in getting to hospital in emergencies.