Word is, there is a Pop up protest on Thursday 13 Aug, 1pm outside Shay Stadium, Halifax. Appropriate placard: Is this what NO PUBLIC OPPOSITION LOOKS LIKE?
Calderdale Council has unanimously agreed a motion that calls on their NHS commissioning partner, Calderdale Clinical Commissioning Group, to delay the public consultation on proposals that are more than likely to cut Calderdale Royal Hospital acute and emergency services, until there is evidence that taking community services out of the hospital and transferring them to GP hubs reduces acute and emergency hospital admissions.
The Council’s motion sidesteps the fact that the Care Closer to Home scheme (transferring community services from the hospital to GP hubs) is a big change to Calderdale NHS and we need to be consulted on this too – not just on the hospital cuts.
What kind of patient care and NHS staff working conditions will come with Care Closer to Home? We know the community hubs will employ less qualified staff like physician associates and there will be big reliance on voluntary carers, family and friends. Continue reading
A couple of documents Calderdale Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) has sent me in response to a Freedom of Information indicate that Calderdale and Huddersfield will not have an A&E service as we know it.
Instead, one of the documents shows that Calderdale CCG and Greater Huddersfield CCG intend to replace Calderdale and Huddersfield A&Es with 3 Urgent Care Centres (also known as Minor Injuries Units) plus a unified Emergency Care Centre on one of the hospital sites. An Emergency Care Centre is not a full, blue light A&E like we currently have at both Calderdale Royal Hospital and Huddersfield Royal Infirmary.
This evening’s Calder Ward Forum at Hope Baptist Chapel (6.15pm for 6.45pm start) is a chance to ask Councillors for information about how a new model of NHS care that is being set up in the Upper Calder Valley is going to affect patients.
The Upper Calder Valley Multi-speciality Community Provider (MCP) Vanguard scheme is a pilot funded by NHS England that aims to set up a “new model of care”, based at the Todmorden Health Centre.
It will fast-track the so-called Care Closer to Home scheme that is part of the Right Care Right Time Right Place proposal to cut and close acute and A&E hospital services, including acute children’s and complex maternity services.
Care Closer to Home aims to make this possible by taking services for the frail elderly, chronically ill and children out of hospital and putting them into the community, on the unfounded assumption that this will cut acute and A&E hospital admissions. Continue reading
Without ever mentioning the private health care companies by name, a recommendation to extend Calderdale’s Virgin Care and Locala GP contracts without putting them out to tender was agreed pretty much as a formality at the first meeting of Calderdale’s Commissioning Primary Medical Services Committee.
The Virgin Care GP contract was the main topic of discussion, since it runs out this September. The extension will take it up to April 2017.
The possibility of not extending the Virgin Care contract was only mentioned once and then dismissed immediately, on the grounds that this risked causing the company to walk away, and patients would have to find other GPs.
But no one could answer questions about the Virgin Care GP practice’s quality and value for money. Continue reading
Only a few months into the privatised wheelchair services contract, patients (and their parents, in the case of children who use wheelchairs) are complaining at their treatment by Opcare Ltd – the company that the Clinical Commissioning Groups awarded the contract to in 2014.
Cllr Megan Swift is investigating complaints by parents of children with disabilities.
Fern Bast, a Hebden Bridge resident with very restricted mobility and in constant pain as a result of spinal degeneration, has complained at the treatment she’s received from Opcare at their outreach clinic site in Halifax. Continue reading
Yesterday a number of Save Calderdale Royal Hospital campaigners attended Calderdale Council’s Adults Health and Social Care Scrutiny Panel, to find out what Calderdale NHS commissioners are planning for Phase 1 of the Right Care Right Place Right Time NHS shake up (which they’ve re-branded as Care Closer to Home.)
After the meeting, those of us who attended were clear that the Scrutiny Panel must use its powers now to stop the the implementation of Phase 1 Care Closer to Home and tell the Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) to formally consult the public on the Care Closer to Home proposals.
This is what happened Continue reading
Save Calderdale Royal Hospital campaigners are glad to find from Cllr Stephen Baine’s Talking Politics column in the 22nd Jan Halifax Courier, that he opposes NHS privatisation.
Cllr Baines criticises Labour’s Andy Burnham for his 2009 decision to offer Hinchingbrooke Hospital in Huntingdon for sale both to NHS organisations and to the private sector.
This was the first time that private companies had been invited to bid to take over and run a large NHS hospital. Continue reading
Calderdale Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service has suffered funding cuts at a time of increased referrals due to rising rates of mental illness and self harm among young people in Calderdale.
In 2013, one in five of Years 7/10 had self harmed, with rates highest among year 10 girls (one in three of whom had self harmed). In 2012/13, Calderdale hospital admissions for self-harm among young people between the ages of 10 and 24 were worse than the England average. [info source: CMBC Plan for Commissioning Services for Children and Young People in Calderdale 2014-16]
A recent report from West and South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw Commissioning Support Unit (CSU) states that there is a high risk that the Child & Adolescent Mental Health Teams, run by the mental health Trust in Calderdale clinics since April 2013, may not be able to adequately meet patients’ needs. Continue reading
Yesterday Calderdale Adults Health and Social Care Scrutiny Panel members failed to use their power to decide whether the Calderdale NHS Commissioners need to consult the public about the new community health care system they are in the process of setting up.
Instead they have given the nod to the CCG to go ahead with their plans and report back to the Scrutiny Panel later.
Members of the public said they had now lost faith in the Scrutiny Panel’s ability or willingness to use its powers to protect the NHS in Calderdale.
One member of the public said,
“They might as well have been saying rhubarb rhubarb for two hours, for all the use that meeting was.”
