HOSPITALS ANNOUNCEMENT - MAINLY HOT AIR?
The Government got a lot of publicity for the announcement about the New Hospital Programme (NHP), including Watford General, last week.
But what did it mean? Maybe not that much.
The key headline was that many of the NHP schemes will be 'fully funded'. To a normal person, that would mean that the Trusts would know exactly how much money they will be getting. They would also know what buildings they are being allowed to construct.
But Governments with an election in the offing don't follow the normal rules.
In fact 'fully funded' is a misleading term. There is a very long way to go before the funding is secured and a design decided on.
This is what the NHP website says about funding:
All schemes within the New Hospital Programme follow a business case process, including being reviewed and agreed by ministers. Final individual allocations for schemes will only be determined once the Full Business Cases have been reviewed and agreed.
Watford General and the rest have not yet finalised the next stage of their applications - the Outline Business Case. The West Herts Trust have got to adapt their 260-foot tower block design to national standards based mainly on factory-made prefabs. That won't be easy, especially given the small and steeply-sloping Watford General car park site.
The Full Business Case may be many months off and a lot could happen before the Treasury finally agree the money.
Schemes won't start main phase construction until 2025 - after the Election.
Watch this space - a lot could happen in the next two years.
WATFORD GENERAL FUTURE - STILL MORE QUESTIONS THAN ANSWERS
The 25 May relaunch for the New Hospital Programme, including news on Watford General's redevelopment, leaves many vital questions unanswered.
The Trust have failed to gain government approval for their preferred option, and are now in the middle of a rushed redesign to meet the Treasury's demands for a standardised national approach based on 'modular' buildings produced in factories, known as 'Hospital 2.0'. No one has explained exactly what 'Hospital 2.0' means.
Tower blocks will be needed to squeeze 1000 beds onto the current surface car park. How high will they have to be? 16 storeys, maybe more.
Whatever happens at Watford General, the problems of access to a constricted and congested site in a highly built-up area will remain. The impact of building work on patients during construction will be severe.
Meanwhile, there is no detail on the future funding of Hemel Hempstead or St Albans Hospitals.
The fact is that the Vicarage Road site is a very bad place to put an emergency care and specialist hospital.
The NHC response to 25 May announcement is here
The Government press release about the announcement is here
WATFORD HOSPITAL WARDS RATED WORST IN NHS FOR FOOD SAFETY
Wards at Watford General Hospital have been officially rated the worst in the whole of the NHS for food safety.
The Food Standards Agency (FSA) has given the Vicarage Road facility a hygiene rating of one out of a possible five, meaning that ‘major improvement’ is necessary.
The Hospital is the only hospital of many hundreds in the NHS in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland to get the 'single star' rating. It has not improved its rating since 2019.
A damning report by Watford Borough Council health inspectors on behalf of the FSA uncovered a litany of hygiene failures. A kitchen in a children’s ward had a dirty floor and bare plaster on the walls. Patients with allergies have been put at ‘serious risk’ by poor safety practices, with stroke patients among those exposed to the danger.
Read the Food safety media release . Read the Watford General Food Safety Report
BOTCHED WATFORD GENERAL PLANS MUST BE REVIEWED
A letter demanding an independent review of the West Herts Trust's botched plans for redeveloping Watford General Hospital has been sent to key health decision-makers.
The letter is jointly signed by Sir Mike Penning, the MP for Hemel Hempstead, and Philip Aylett, the Co-ordinator of the New Hospital Campaign. It has gone to Health Secretary Steve Barclay and the Integrated Care Board for Herts and West Essex.
The letter shows that Watford General is not a suitable site for redevelopment. It is extremely congested, inaccessible - and unpopular.
All options for the Vicarage Road site are unaffordable or offer very poor value for money - or both. Taxpayers will lose out if the Trust persist with their plans.
The Campaign believes a completely new emergency care and specialist hospital on a clear and accessible new central site would be the better way forward.
Public confidence in the Trust’s plans for redevelopment at Watford General is in doubt and political support is weak.
The letter calls for a fully independent review. This must allow for a genuine assessment of all options. The Trust should not conduct or even supervise the review, given its history of error and confusion over the project.
The full letter is below:
WEST HERTS TRUST BOTTOM OF THE LEAGUE FOR PLANNED TREATMENT
West Herts Hospitals Trust has been lagging behind the rest of the English NHS when it comes to elective - planned - treatment.
A recent Health Service Journal article pointed out that the Trust is way behind its target to do more elective work. The targets have been set by the NHS to push trusts into recovering from the backlog of work caused by Covid.
But West Herts is far off the national pace. In early 2022-23 it only managed to do 77 per cent of the pre-pandemic level of elective work, and has been told to increase this to 103 per cent.
This poor performance puts it well behind other local trusts, such as Bedfordshire including Luton and Dunstable, which is achieving 95 per cent of the pre-pandemic figure, and East and North Herts (including Lister) which is recovering well to achieve 110 percent.
And the many years of construction work planned by the Trust on the site of Watford General (and St Albans City) will probably deter people from choosing W Herts. The result will be financial pain for our Trust as patients vote with their feet to avoid our building site hospitals.
Photo: Clay Banks on Unsplash