Yesterday I attended an open day at the Whittington Hospital.
I was interested to see the buildings that the trust are planning to sell off,
and so booked myself, along with my husband and two children, on the tour.
We were led by Phlip Ient, the Whittington’s Director of Estates and Facilities. The first building we viewed, albeit from the outside,
was Waterlow, which is the big big brick building on Highgate Hill, straight
after the ‘Whittington & Cat’ pub. The building has been empty for ten years,
having originally been part of the mental health services accommodation.
Behind this building was historically nurses’ accommodation.
It looks quite dilapidated from the outside but it is still occupied, now by
medical students, letting them live right next to their place of study at very
modest prices. Once this is sold off, medical students will instead live in accommodation
on Sussex Way. Although of a much better standard, this accommodation will cost students
about three times as much.
We asked whether this might deter some students from
studying medicine, seeing as a degree in medicine is already reported to cost
students somewhere in the region of £100,000? Mr Ient said that many students
already take advantage of the better accommodation at Sussex Way. What he
neglected to say was that many of them do not, and are currently residing in
the accommodation at the Whittington, which they are planning to sell off.
On the other side of this building, on the ground floor the
Whittington currently houses the physiotherapy department. I have made use of
these services myself and can report that the staff were excellent and the
service first class. Mr Ient explained that they need to move the physio department
into the main hospital because it would be “better”. Better, how, I asked? He
replied that people cannot find where it is at the moment. I responded by
saying that I had never had a problem finding it, probably because there are
lots of signs up and my appointment letter came complete with a map.
We then discussed the issue of the maternity wing, which
needs modernisation – no arguments there. I know many women who have given birth
at the Whittington and have reported that the facilities are positively
Victorian. Mr Ient said that they needed to improve or they would lose ‘business’
to better maternity services, such as those at University College Hospital.
He said that they are aiming to increase births to around
6000 per year. I asked why then, in the original plans, they had said they were
‘capping’ births at 4000 per year? “We made a mistake there,” he admitted. “Well,
I did.”
“When it comes to maternity services,” he explained, “it
doesn’t make any money for us. We just about make the money back that we put
in, but that’s about it.”
We found it staggering that he was talking as though the NHS,
and, by extension, the issue of life and death, was a money-making venture.
Profits and loses. But then, with the marketisation of our health service,
introduced by Labour and carrying on apace under the Tory-Lib Dem Coalition,
that is exactly what we have now. It is thoroughly depressing, as all health
campaigners will attest.
I asked why, when the Care Quality Commission reported just two
weeks ago that the Whittington was doing well in all areas except putting
patients on the correct wards, due to lack of beds, they are planning to close
a further 177 beds over the next five years? I was given the answer that,
because of the way they planned to care for people at home, they would not need
beds as much any more. Reiterating the point that the board members keep making,
that the ‘clinical advice’ is that keeping people in hospital is a bad idea, he
explained that there would be 60 beds
closed initially, with the space being used as an open-plan admin space. If, he
went on, there were more beds needed again in the future, they could turn the
space back into a ward. Why don’t I believe that would be likely to happen?
In conclusion, we went home with Ham’n’High bags full of
crap for the kids (they foisted these on us, naturally), and heavy hearts about
the future of our local hospital and the NHS in general.
No comments:
Post a Comment