Joint Health Scrutiny hear of plans for future health services

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NHS organisations have reported back to Shropshire and Telford and Wrekin’s Joint Health Scrutiny Committee (Joint HOSC) on the work they have carried out to plan how acute and community hospitals that serve the borough and Shropshire will be re-configured.

It is now planned that work to develop the options for future services will be developed during the spring and summer 2014 and the consultation will be carried out the autumn of 2014. Any decision about the future arrangement of services will be made by January 2015.
 
The committee recognised the scale of the task and agreed that the revised timetable, which has been pushed back by around six months, while still ambitious, was achievable.

Cllr. Derek White, who chaired the Joint HOSC meeting, said: 

“Hospital services in Telford and Wrekin and Shropshire has been a contentious issue for many years.

“As the Joint HOSC, we will not take a political stance on this – we will make sure that through this Clinical Service Review, the NHS organisations work with local people and other organisations to find a solution that will last for the long term.

“Local people who rely on these services cannot afford to lose this opportunity and we must ensure that the NHS and local partners get the decision right.”

Cllr. Gerald Dakin, the co-chair from Shropshire Council, added:

“Our role as the Joint HOSC is not to make decisions but to ensure that the decisions the NHS makes are in the interest of local people and the decision is made in the right way.

“We will also want continued assurance from the NHS that while this work is being carried out, the services at our hospitals are safe and provide best value for within the money available.”