June decision on hospital

Fiona Howard 1564 - 1564 • Published 4 Jun 2009 09:56

THE decision on the future of the Vale of Leven Hospital is expected before the Scottish Parliament goes into recess at the end of June.

And it is hoped that, following a final meeting with members of the Hospitalwatch Campaign, Cabinet Secretary for Health and Wellbeing Nicola Sturgeon, may save the Christie Ward.

Attending the meeting were Hospitalwatch chairman Councillor Vivien Dance, mental health campaigner Eileen Gorie, convener of the Community Care Forum and Public Partnership Forum member Jim Proctor, the Rev Ian Miller of Bonhill Church, Lily Kennedy of the Elderly Forum and a member of staff from the Fruin Ward.

The Minister welcomed the delegation and said she recognised that without the campaigning of Hospitalwatch the hospital would probably have already been closed.

The group explained that Hospitalwatch had attended all 19 consultation meetings as well as submitting a written response to the Vision for the Vale document.

They pointed out that when it came to considering the vision document members of the Greater Glasgow and Clyde Health Board had not made any reference at all to the results of the consultation and had not made any changes to the document in the light of the views expressed by the consultees.

Councillor Dance said afterwards: 'It was obvious that they had not changed their minds about anything and that is unusual.

'You expect that a consultation process will result in some changes as evidence that they had been listening.'

Mrs Gorie concentrated on the effect of the loss of the Christie Ward and mental health care issues and it was pointed out that in every instance the Christie ward had come out on top for services and had only been earmarked for closure on financial grounds.

Mr Miller made his plea on the basis of the confusion over the letter from the Royal Alexandra consultants and the fact that after condemning the proposals for the Vale were now backing them. He said it was now unclear whether the Vale would be run on the basis of GP-led care with consultant back-up or consultant-led with GP back-up and asked for clarification on what model of care was proposed.

Mr Proctor outlined the history which had led them to this point and asked the Minister to make a dramatic change to the financial settlements around the Vale.

The group also asked the Minister to insist the Vale is properly classified so that there is a clear definition of what standard of services could and should be expected and there will be clear ways of spotting any downgrading.

They criticised the Health Board for assessing the north of the river option on purely financial grounds and also asked that she extend the three year trial of the midwife led maternity unit to run from the point at which the decision on the Vision is taken rather than from some months ago because there had been no obvious effort to promote the unit and to make its services more public.

They reminded the Minister that the decision of the Vale is a political one and that 18,000 voters had turned out to support the Hospitalwatch campaign.

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This article appeared in Helensburgh Advertiser 05 Jun 09

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