Dismay as NHS care revamp
‘plunged
into farce’

NHS managers face accusations landmark plans for sweeping changes to services for 800,000 people in the region have been plunged into “farce” after they yesterday failed to set out long-awaited proposals to transform care.

In a highly unusual move, dismayed non-executive directors at NHS North Yorkshire and York branded as “hugely disappointing” a report setting out eight themes for future changes instead of an expected shortlist of options to reconfigure health services which are mired in a decade-long financial crisis.

Anger was further fuelled after it was disclosed taxpayers have forked out £320,000 for work by management consultants KPMG which helped NHS officials in drawing up the report.

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Health services in North Yorkshire must make at least £55m cuts in savings in 2013-14 but the delay has exacerbated concerns financial difficulties will worsen amid indications officials are struggling to secure a consensus over the way forward.

Board members had been expected to approve the report but instead agreed to accept it as they said there was nothing to approve.

Coun Jim Clark, chairman of North Yorkshire County Council’s health scrutiny committee, later said the county’s NHS was no nearer solving its financial problems, branding proceedings at a meeting in York “a farce”.

He warned of the dangers of a worsening postcode lottery of care with each of the new GP-led clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) in the county “doing their own thing” to change services.

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“All they’ve done is kicked the can down the road,” he said. “The fact they couldn’t even approve the report tells us everything. This doesn’t take us any further.”

Board chairman Kevin McAleese told the meeting he was expecting definitive proposals and it was “hugely disappointing” the report lacked details.

He said the county’s NHS had been handed some of the lowest funding in the country but there was nothing in the report to set out how it would balance the books even in the coming year.

Colleague Maureen Vevers said it was a “missed opportunity” and vice chairman Geoff Donnelly said it was a “real surprise” there were no details of urgently-needed changes.

“Doing nothing is not an option,” he said.

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The report, drawn up with input from 200 clinicians, warns the county could be up to £150m in the red by 2016-17 unless action is taken. It pledges to retain 24-hour consultant-led A&E services and maternity care in Harrogate, Scarborough and York which had been in doubt in an early long-list of options.

Reviews will be carried out of minor injury services. out-of-hours care and midwife-led birth units. Emergency surgery could be centralised and more support offered to nursing and residential homes.

NHS North Yorkshire and York chief executive Chris Long told the meeting it had been “damn hard work getting everybody together and getting to a point where people agreed”.

“We ended up having to write a report acceptable to all bodies,” he said.

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He said later it had become clear early on that a shortlist of options would not be drawn up as it would be up to local clinicians to deliver solutions in their communities. He also defended the cost of the advice from KPMG which he said provided expertise the NHS did not have.

Filey GP Phil Garnett, chairman of the new Scarborough and Ryedale CCG, said achieving consensus was crucial. He added: “These are very important decisions and I want to make sure they are the right decisions.”

Comment: Page 12.

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