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Peter Black and South Wales West Liberal DemocratsRepresenting Aberavon, Bridgend, Gower, Neath, Ogmore, Port Talbot, and Swansea |
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Leaked minutes reveal plan to axe Singleton Hospital
September 29, 2006 9:26 AM
Peter Black and Swansea West Candidate Peter May at Singleton Hospital
Minutes of a confidential meeting obtained by Welsh Liberal Democrat Assembly Member, Peter Black, reveal that Swansea NHS Trust have abandoned the idea of a new hospital on the Felindre site and are planning to shut Singleton Hospital and transfer all its services to Morriston.
The minutes are of a workshop held on 3 August 2006 on re-shaping health services in Swansea. Those present include acting Chief Executive, Calum Campbell and representatives of the Trust's consultants, Gleeds Management Services. In the minutes Trust officials discuss the idea of developing a single hospital site at Morriston. Proposals to build a new hospital at Felindre are dismissed as having 'planning risks'.
The minutes go on to speculate that Singleton Hospital will lose A&E, diagnostics and the ICU, effectively turning it into a Primary Care Resource Centre. Cancer patients will be moved when the linear accelerators reach the end of their operational lives. They state that selling Singleton will gain the Trust's commitment to the project. Services to be retained at Singleton could include out patients, minor injury unit and day surgery but keeping some of these services will maintain the disadvantages and inefficiencies of split site working and duplication. Senior Trust officials are advising that the vision for Singleton must be the removal of all beds.
"What is obvious from these minutes is that the Trust's known preference for a single hospital serving all of Swansea no longer involves a new build at a site such as Felindre. Instead they are proposing the dismantling of Singleton Hospital and the transfer of all its services to Morriston," said Mr. Black.
"The public are being led to believe that this transition will be painless but the reality is that it will leave people in the west of Swansea and Gower having to travel further for crucial hospital services.
"If this has been the intention of Swansea NHS Trust all along then they should come out and say so openly so we can have a discussion about their plans and their implications for health care locally. I am particularly concerned at the long term loss of 350 beds and how money will be found to invest in essential community services."
It was reported to the meeting that their target is 1,100 beds in the Swansea Trust area, a reduction of 350. They refer to the Middlesex Hospital Study in which 33% of acute beds were moved into community care and report that this is viewed as a flagship scheme by the Welsh Assembly Government which they expect Swansea to match or improve upon.
Mr Black Added: "On past form there is a real danger that the Trust will expect Swansea Council to pick up the tab for these radical changes. That is neither sustainable nor acceptable and cannot form part of the Trust's plans."
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