Agenda item

12:30

Yvonne Taylor, Chief Operating Officer, Pete McGrane, Clinical Director for Older People’s Services and Anne Brierley, Service Director for Older People’s Services, Oxford Health, will attend to provide an update on community hospitals with specific reference to Townlands, Didcot and Bicester.

Two reports are attached at JHO10:

·         A report on Didcot Hospital closures submitted to the South West Oxfordshire Locality Patient Participation Group.

·         A briefing paper from Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust.

Cllr Nick Hards was invited to address the meeting prior to discussion of the item. He raised a number of points relating to Didcot Hospital following a stint of voluntary work three years ago. These included:

·         Staffing – he had noticed a problem with agency staff having to travel long distances from places such as Gloucestershire each day;

·         An imbalance in facilities for the south of the county. Didcot was the largest growing area of Oxfordshire for housing. The hospital was very well situated near to the area where most of the additional housing was to be situated, adding that there was a substantial amount of land in which to expand. However, the site needed a strategic look at medical practice and mental health facilities. He asked that, for the above reasons, the Committee support a higher priority being given to the planning of health services.

The Committee welcomed Yvonne Taylor, Chief Operating Officer, Pete McGrane, Clinical Director for Older People’s Services and Anne Brierley, Service Director for Older People’s Services, Oxford Health, to the meeting to provide an update on community Hospitals, with specific reference to Townlands, Didcot and Bicester.

Two reports were attached at JHO10:

·         A report on Didcot Hospital closures submitted to the South West Oxfordshire Locality Patient Participation Group; and

·         A briefing paper from Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust.

In relation to Cllr Hards’ address, Yvonne Taylor responded that there was a need to look at the shape and range of bed based care across Oxfordshire to ensure that the NHS were able to deliver sub - acute care. Work was ongoing with OUHT on this.

The Panel were asked what measures were being taken to attract qualified candidates into the service so that there was less reliance on agency staff. Anne Brierley responded that a balance was required between experienced and student nursing staff. There was no easy solution to attracting staff in view of the high cost of living locally, but there were key strategies in train to address this. For example, OUHT were looking at a programme of rotations of staff and were working with Oxford Brookes University on their ‘return to practice’ courses. They were also looking to recruit key nurses in London as the cost of living was slightly lower in Oxfordshire. In addition a number of successful open days had taken place in the hospitals, which had gleaned a better intake of high calibre staff. In response to a question from the Committee about the uptake of key worker housing, it was reported that this was proving less attractive to people nowadays than when it had first started.

Councillor Les Sibley, local member, asked why there had been a delay to the opening of Bicester’s new Community Hospital and why there was an insufficiency of beds for the ever increasing population of the Bicester area. He added that the Cherwell local Plan had indicated that an extension to the hospital was required to ensure that the Health infrastructure grew at the same rate as the community. Moreover, Bicester was set to become the second largest town in Oxfordshire, adding that now was the opportunity to bring forward an extension programme.

Yvonne Taylor explained that the completed building had to be made safe to house the patients and that there were snagging issues normal for a new building. Also staff training had to take place prior to opening. She added that all of these issues were managed by NHS Property. Preparations to make the move during the first week of December were underway, but beyond this, the move would take place in the New Year because of the holiday period.

In response to a request about the possibility of keeping the older hospital open to help with winter pressures on beds, Yvonne Taylor said that although she recognised that this would be helpful, there would still only be staffing available for 12 beds and also that ownership of the old hospital would transfer out of the NHS once the move had taken place.

When asked about the sufficiency of car parking facilities, Yvonne Taylor responded that this was not set by the NHS but by the local planning authority. She added that a number of public meetings had taken place on the plans with the opportunity given to voice views at the time.

Cllr Sibley commented that the local plan had indicated that there would be 4 additional beds and asked if it would be possible to add bed space in the future. Yvonne Taylor informed him that the hospital had been built under design and the contract had been set some years ago. Oxford Health was the provider and it was not in their gift to increase bed numbers.

In response to a question about incentives for nursing staff, such as overtime opportunities and free car parking, Anne Brierley explained that they had not deviated from national Terms & Conditions. As far as the employment of agency nurses was concerned, she added that agency workers were a fact of life and that the Trust worked very hard with agency providers to ensure the quality of nursing staff. Pete McGrane informed the Committee of a number of issues that had been identified to attract nurses to consider community nursing:

·         An upskill of clinical staff – the University of the West of England provided a day course to give staff more clinical skills; and

·         A series of open days.

With regard to points raised about demographic increases across Oxfordshire, Anne Brierley explained that the issue was how to balance resources against need. New housing tended to attract young families and there would be a need to provide the kind of services all would need. Pete McGrane added that GPs recognised the changes in their responsibilities to patients in the current time – such as greater acuity which gave a diagnostic challenge to get patients out of hospital on a more sustained recovery. This would be a challenge to their competency to manage the process. There was much more of a need for strategic discussion about how to align the bed base, for example.

The panellists were asked how the relocation of Oxford Community Hospital was going. They responded that the move was going well and there was more opportunity for levels of clinical support. The Trust was pleased to see that HWO were doing a ‘walk-through’ talking to patients about their experiences. They welcomed in particular their involvement with the mental health patients as well as the physical health patients.

When asked by the Committee what was going to improve in the community hospitals, Peter McGrane said that there was a significant drive to use technology within healthcare. For example, a piece of work was underway with a view to introducing simple technology with which to use video conferencing between the patient and the consultant. He commented, however, that there was a need to consider, generally, that of information governance and security. A further example given was to establish a nutritional standards policy with a trust-wide clinically led group doing regular dietary reviews. The Panel agreed that the hospitals were struggling to provide GP input.

The Committee AGREED to thank all for attending and responding to questions.