Children’s surgery to move out of Rotherham

Health bosses approved changes on Wednesday (28) which will see non-emergency procedures at certain times of the week moved out of the borough.

Operations to be moved to Doncaster Royal Infirmary, Sheffield Children’s Hospital or Pinderfields General Hospital, Wakefield, include ear, nose and throat, urology and general surgery.

Des Breen, medical director for the Working Together Partnership — a group of eight NHS organisations, said: “We’ve been facing a number of issues which mean that we need to change how we provide emergency out of hours operations.

“Nationally, we don’t have enough expert staff to provide care in all hospitals all of the time and patients in some areas are having better experiences than others. 

“We also know that we need to change how we work now so that we don’t face more problems in the future.”

The changes will begin in January and the partnership says it should affect fewer than 20 Rotherham operations a year.