PRESS STATEMENT 3 February 2003

STILL THE SAME MESSAGE - WHY DON'T THEY LISTEN?

A few days ago new figures revealed that the county's largest hospital, RCH Treliske, has continuing problems in trying to deal with its emergency admissions. Ambulance turn-around times at the hospital average at almost an hour, over three times the target. This is caused by a shortage of available beds and/or staff at the hospital, causing patients to be kept waiting in ambulances or on trolleys. Speaking on local radio, Jo Manning, Assistant Chief Ambulance Officer for the Westcountry Ambulance Services Trust, explained the difficulties of meeting the target times in a large geographical area where there was only one District General Hospital.

In response Marna Blundy, Co-ordinator of West Cornwall HealthWatch, writes:
"There is nothing new in these figures - but sadly there is nothing new in the NHS response to them either. We learn that two more temporary wards are to be provided at Treliske in an attempt to reduce the ambulance and trolley waits. Mr Brian Milstead, Chief Executive of the Royal Cornwall Hospitals Trust, advised the newly formed Cornwall Overview and Scrutiny Committee last week that the population of Cornwall could not sustain a second District General Hospital. This goes against the resolution passed by the Cornwall Community Health Council in June 2002 which stated that Cornwall needed more than one Accident and Emergency Department. Indeed, West Cornwall HealthWatch in its document "A County in Crisis----a County at Risk!" (July 2002) identified several areas of the country, with comparable populations, which have more than one Accident and Emergency Department. We have consistently called for this county to have two District General Hospitals.

It is no more than simple common sense. In a county the size of Cornwall, with a growing and a higher-than-average elderly population, it is the height of foolishness to expect all A&E cases to be transported to one main site at Treliske. After all, if you keep pouring tea into a teacup, eventually the cup becomes full, and it is quite ridiculous to think you can keep on pouring - you obviously need a second cup! Why can the NHS community not realise this? The site at Treliske is overloaded, the staff overstretched, the ambulance service frustrated, the patients the innocent victims of the crisis. We don't blame any of the front-line NHS staff - they are doing as good a job as they possibly can. What is needed is a second A&E Department. If the local health management won't listen to the views of those who own the NHS - the public - let us hope that the new Strategic Health Authority will."

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