Fears over hospital bed cuts to be raised in Holyrood
Exclusive: Helen Puttick, Health Correspondent 3 Jun 2010 The axing of hundreds of hospital beds across Shadow health secretary Jackie Baillie will say that consultants working for NHS Greater Glasgow and A drop in ward beds by as much as 20% is among their chief concerns, according to Baillie. She will tell MSPs today: “A senior surgeon is reported to have said: ‘I’ll be very surprised if patients’ operations aren’t cancelled just before surgery’.” The board last night denied the scale of the reductions, but admitted that almost 400 beds were due to go over the next 15 months. Across It has already emerged that NHS GGC is also planning to cut 1200 jobs this year. NHS Lothian now plans to cut 700 staff, NHS Tayside 500 and NHS Grampian almost 600. Hundreds of nurses’ posts will disappear in the cull. Health campaigners have been concerned about a big drop in bed numbers in They say they have always struggled to get a clear indication of how capacity would be affected by this reorganisation. Dr Robert Cumming, chairman of the Scottish Health Campaigns Network, which unites protesters against NHS service closures, said he was “extremely concerned” about Baillie’s information. He said: “The bed structure in Baillie will tell Parliament that patients have already had procedures postponed with little warning. She will say: “This week I have been contacted by two constituents; one had their surgery cancelled with less than four hours to go. We were told that it was human error, there were too many admissions. In another case, planned surgery was moved to another more distant hospital. The reason given … ‘pressure’.” Her attack will come during an Opposition debate on the cutbacks health boards are having to make to stay in budget. Baillie told The Herald: “You simply cannot remove this number of beds or make doctors, nurses and midwives redundant without damaging patient care. “I believe that these cuts are unacceptable and am calling on ministers to publish the workforce planning projections for every Scottish health board, so that we know the scale of the job losses they are demanding across the country.” Medical advances have meant fewer patients need to be kept in hospital overnight after surgery, reducing the demand for beds. However, Cumming said the rising elderly population meant there were more sick patients who needed to be admitted to hospital for care. He added: “There are also more ‘revolving door’ patients – people who are discharged into the community, not necessarily with the full support, and come back into the hospital again. This produces an additional stress.” However, a spokesman for Greater Glasgow said: “We strenuously deny the suggestion that we are planning a reduction of 20% of beds. NHSGGC currently has more than 7100 beds. Over the next 15 months …we expect to reduce (that) by some 5.4%. “Like all boards, we are working to improve efficiency across all services and shift the balance of care away from inpatient to day care and outpatient care wherever appropriate. “We are currently midway through a major modernisation programme that will see us invest more than £1 billion in new hospital accommodation … we have recently opened two major £100 million hospitals which will significantly increase the proportion of day surgery … and we are also investing significantly in alternative community-based services. “We have consistently made clear over the past decade that these improvements will result in a reduction in the number of beds required to support these new models of care.”
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