Kaya Makarau-Schwartz, a volunteer for the save the Whittington campaign, writes a background guide to the proposals on the Whittington.

The Whittington Hospital serves 250,000 in the boroughs of Islington and Haringey from parts of Barnet and Camden. It has benefited from large amounts of investment over the few years these include, £30 million on a new wing including an Intensive Care unit. Also, the refurbishment of the maternity unit which includes a new birth centre, a neonatal intensive care unit that was expanded through an investment of £600,000 and a new £500,000 paediatric A&E unit was opened in 2008.

The Hospital employs 2000 members of staff and has a 400 bed capacity. In 2009 they treated 20,000 inpatients 16,000 day cases and saw 233,000 outpatients. The maternity delivered 3683 babies and the Accident and Emergency department treated 80,000 people. The Whittington also has very high levels of bed occupancy. The Hospital is sited in a densely populated area and is near major transport intersections.

The North Central London services and organisational review (covering Barnet, Camden, Haringey and Islington) has been looking at the implications of the Framework for action – Healthcare of London report. This has included services under the remit of Islington PCT including the Wittington Hospital. The report published by the review looked at the Clinical Advisory groups consideration of models set out in the framework and concluded that in the North Central London region there should only be three Major Acute Hospitals two of which are proposed to be in Camden and two local hospitals.

The review did not consider the Whittington in the short list as a major acute hospital which would have major implications on the existing services at the Wittington and the populations they serve.

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Background, Kaya Macarau-Schwartz, Whittington

There were two points made at the public meeting on Monday which I thought were very important:

1) Government policy is to keep an A&E department at the Whittington: Health Care for London, the government strategy for the future of the London NHS lists the Whittington as a local hospital and says that all local hospitals should have an A&E department, intensive care unit and maternity unit. If NHS London do come up with plans to close the Whittington A&E they will be breaking government policy.

2) The whole process might turn out to be unnecessary: NHS London tell us that they need to save money to close a blackhole in their funding in future years. But this worry is based on a projection of how much money they might get from future governments, and how much health services might cost to deliver in 10 years time, and both of these are very difficult to predict. For example, the growth in obesity seems to be slowing much quicker than expected, which will save the NHS a lot of money. Equally, if we keep moving quickly out of recession tax revenues will be up and there will be more money for the NHS. It seems daft to start the process of making massive decisions about the future of health services in North London now when we are in a very uncertain political and financial context.

Whatever happens NHS London did say that they will not agree any ‘options’ for the Whittington until the late Summer and will not consult until the Autumn, so we have plenty of time to build the campaign to tell NHS London that the Whittington must keep its major services.

Dazi, Health Care for London

Here is a few, quickly edited, short clips of the Save the Whittington meeting last night. Lots more to follow later.

Archway, Public Meeting

We are now approaching 2,000 signatures on the online petition to save the Whittington – have you added your name yet?

But we need your help.  We need to show how strong the local support for the Whittington Hospital is, and that is why we want to reach 2,000 signatures before the end of January.  Click here to signing the petition to Save the Whittington Hospital

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Come to the Save the Whittington public meeting called by Jeremy Corbyn MP on Monday 25th January 2010 at 7.00pm.

The meeting will take place in Archway Methodist Church. You can find a map to the venue here.

The meeting is to organise our campaign and to get answers to the questions we asked NHS Islington last year.

And don’t forget, if you haven’t already signed the petition, please click here.

Public Meeting

A quick post to note that more than 1000 people have now signed our on-line petition to save the Whittington.

Thank you to everyone who has supported this campaign so for and please encourage your family, friends and work colleagues to sign up as well.

Do read today’s Islington Tribune for more coverage of our public meeting earlier in the week: http://www.islingtontribune.com/news/2009/dec/save-our-hospital

Petition

Almost 300 local residents met in a packed Archway Methodist Church last night to campaign against the possible closure of the Whittington Hospital’s A&E department. The meeting saw the first signs of the campaign’s pressure paying off.

The meeting was called by Jeremy Corbyn MP, who was joined by MPs Emily Thornberry and David Lammy as well as Karen Jennings, UNISON’s National Secretary for Health.

Also speaking at the meeting was Rachel Tyndell, who is chairing the review into health provision in North Central London, who explained what the regional NHS is planning.

The standing-room-only crowd told their stories of what the Whittington means to them and why they oppose any closure.

The meeting also saw the first signs of a shift from NHS London as retaining A&E was included as one of the options that the review will now look at (more…)

Jeremy Corbyn, Public Meeting, save the whittington

This Wednesday, you can have your chance to have a say on the Whittington Hospital campaign at the public meeting.

The meeting is taking place from 7pm at Archway Methodist Church, Archway Close, London N19 3TD.

Also, it’s not too late to sign the petition. We want to keep the pressure up in the campaign, so please sign the petition if you haven’t already.
www.savethewhittington.org.uk/petition

Archway, Jeremy Corbyn, meeting

The following motion was agreed unanimously at last night’s Islington Council meeting:

Council is concerned that Accident and Emergency services at Whittington Hospital, Archway are under threat and could be cut under plans put forward by the NHS.

Council notes that:

The plans were revealed in a letter from North Central London NHS sub-region which sets out four options for reorganising NHS services across North London. All four options described in the letter would see Whittington designated as a local hospital with ‘no emergency services’, which will mean casualty services being axed.

The loss of the Whittington’s Accident and Emergency department – the only remaining in either Islington or our neighbouring borough of Haringey would be to the severe detriment of our local community. It would lead to significantly increasing journey times to A&E and mean local residents would be unable to access basic emergency health service in their own borough.

Council is further concerned that there could be more cuts to services at the Whittington.

Council calls on the NHS to retain the Accident and Emergency Service at the Whittington Hospital and provide assurances that no services will be lost at the Whittington.

Council therefore asks the Leader of the Council, with support from local Members of Parliament and Assembly Members, to write to the Chief Executive of the North Central London NHS sub-region expressing our deep concern about the future of the Whittington and our desire to see its Accident and Emergency Service remain open.

Islington Council

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