Doctors back Mexborough hospital shake-up

Under the proposals, patients with serious conditions like breathing difficulties and heart and stroke problems who need a ‘blue light’ ambulance will no longer be treated at the Adwick Road hospital.

Instead they will be taken to Rotherham, Doncaster or Barnsley hospitals.

The plans, which have been subject to a three-month consultation programme, would also see a new specialist rehabilitation unit at Montagu.

GPs from Doncaster Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) have agreed to support the proposals which will be decided on next month.

Dr Sam Feeney said: “We have carefully considered the responses we received from the public and other interested organisations during the consultation exercise.

“We received only one formal objection and, on the whole, patients and the public were positive about the planned changes.

“We have been able to reassure people that a new rehabilitation centre at Montagu, supported by more care at home, would speed up recovery and result in better health outcomes, helping patients to quickly get back to everyday life.”

During the consultation, which ended last month, people were given the opportunity to hear the proposals explained at a series of public meetings in the Doncaster and Dearne Valley areas.

The proposals also include expanding health and community care services to put increased emphasis on providing more care at home and carrying out more day surgery and endoscopy investigations at Montagu Hospital.

Dr Feeney added: “The proposals were formally presented to 25 meetings involving NHS and local authority organisations and eight of them were held in public at community venues.

“More than 5,000 explanatory leaflets and 500 posters were distributed across the borough and we worked closely with the local media to make them aware.

“In addition, the special information section created on the NHS Doncaster website to support the consultation received hundreds of hits.”

Before the consultation started, local clinicians decided that Montagu Hospital should stop admitting emergency patients brought in by ‘blue light’ ambulances.

This followed guidance from the Royal College of Physicians which states that patients suffering from serious medical problems should be treated at a hospital that has a much wider range of facilities than are available at Montagu, including intensive care and more diagnostic services.

A decision on the changes will be made by the NHS South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw Cluster Board on February 20.

A summary of the outcome of the consultation is available at www.doncaster.nhs.uk

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