Co-ordinator: Marna Blundy, 4 Botallack Moor, St Just, PENZANCE, Cornwall TR19 7QH
Tel / Fax 01736 788107 Email: westcornwallhealthwatch@yahoo.co.uk

PRESS STATEMENT 9th July 2001

A recent advertisement in the British Medical Journal for a Consultant Physician in Cardiology and General Medicine at Treliske has aroused the indignation of members of , who are fighting for a fair deal for West Cornwall Hospital in Penzance. The advertisement makes no mention of West Cornwall Hospital, despite the undisputed need for a cardiologist in Penzance to replace Dr Gibbons, whose position has remained unadvertised and unfilled since his departure several years ago.

The failure to mention Penzance in the advertisement will undoubtedly add fuel to the argument that West Cornwall Hospital is being sidelined, and that services are being increasingly centralised on the Treliske site. That this is happening despite the ongoing Review of Services, which has not yet announced a choice of options for the future of West Cornwall Hospital, indicates that decisions have already been made which preclude any possibility of developing cardiology services in Penzance.

When the Royal College of Physicians sent a Review Team to Penzance last December, the team observed that Treliske and West Cornwall Hospitals "seemed to work independently of each other and not as one Trust. Any developments and plans in the future must take place as one Trust."

spokeswoman Marna Blundy said this week: "We are disappointed that as yet the Royal Cornwall Hospitals Trust has not learned the necessity of including West Cornwall Hospital properly in its development plans. We have been saying for ages that patients will be better served throughout the county if resources and staffing are shared fairly between Treliske, St Michael's and West Cornwall Hospitals. Yet the Trust continues to pour investment into Treliske at the expense of the others, as this latest advertisement makes clear."

At the recent meeting in Penzance with Professor Sir George Alberti, President of the Royal College of Physicians, he had stated the importance of consultants being prepared to travel down from Treliske to provide a proper service for West Cornwall. Professor Sir George has now responded to the advertisement as follows:
"This is of course typical of the problem we discussed, i.e. no communication between the two halves of the Trust and apparently very little appreciation of what is needed in Penzance."

has now written to the Chief Executive of the Trust, expressing particular concern about the implications of the advertisement and requesting an assurance that new appointments will include an undertaking to rotate work between the different hospitals in the Trust.