Agenda item

Presented by: CC Steve Holgate

On 13 April, Lancashire Teaching Hospitals Trust notified a number of stakeholders and the public that they had taken the decision to temporarily close the A&E Department at Chorley and South Ribble Hospital and introduce an Urgent Care Service which would be open between the hours of 8am and 8pm with a GP Out of Hours service overnight.  The reason given by the Trust for the decision was due to insufficient numbers of middle grade doctors required to deliver a safe service.  The temporary change came into effect on Monday 18 April 2016.

The Health Scrutiny Committee consequently held a series of meetings to establish how the situation came to be, what steps needed to be taken by the Trust to resolve the situation, and what lessons could be learnt from the NHS for the future.

The report produced and circulated to committee members outlined the background, findings, conclusions and recommendations following investigations from the Committee.

Members of the Committee were invited to comment and raise questions and a summary of the discussion is set out below:

·  It was confirmed that the first step would be the receipt of the plan from the Trust for service provision by 22 November.  Members agreed there would be a need for regular updates in relation to the plan. It was confirmed that a request for weekly updates would be submitted to the Trust.

·  Members felt that the national picture was an indication of the recruitment issues, despite the agency cap put in place to alleviate this, and there was a need to maintain a strategic view across Lancashire.

·  It was proposed that there was a need to look at funding to assist with the outcomes and how the sector was going to meet the funding gap which links to the Sustainability and Transformation Plan.

·  It was suggested that the Trusts could engage together more effectively to identify new ways to assist with the current staffing issues.  It was confirmed that this would be fed back to the Trust on behalf of Committee.

·  In relation to the Urgent Care Centre increasing the opening hours to midnight, members requested assurances that the Trust would advise the Committee once additional staff were available to meet this recommendation.

·  Members agreed there was a need to ensure effective communication to the public on the Urgent Care Centre service offer.

·  It was suggested that there may be a need to understand whether the staffing issues were as a consequence of the high cost to undertake the necessary qualifications and how this could be addressed.

·  The Health Scrutiny Committee gave thanks for the support from Wendy Broadley and Josh Mynott in the production of this comprehensive report.

Following discussions, the Committee requested amendments to two of the recommendations in the report:

Recommendation 8 - The Trust should make every effort to increase the Urgent Care Centre opening hours on the Chorley site to 6am – midnight as additional staff are appointed – to include effective publicising of the Urgent Care Centre to give members of the public a greater understanding of the services provided to assist with the pressure on neighbouring hospitals.

Recommendation 10 - For the future, a more open approach to the design and delivery changes to the local health economy needs to take place, working with wider public services through the Lancashire Health and Wellbeing Board to make our hospitals more sustainable and better able to serve the needs of residents – to include engagement with residents to understand what services are available and where.

Resolved: The Health Scrutiny Committee approved the recommendations contained within the report attached at Appendix A (subject to amendments suggested).