Category: Health

Cabinet meeting – 14th April 2011 – Election Special Edition – Part 2 – NHS questions

In conclusion he said that change was the only constant, stressed the importance of the Health and Wellbeing Board, said that there was a constant focus on interagency working and that the footprint (meaning the population a hospital served) would be changing. Cllr Green spoke about the partnership work and referred to his role as … Continue reading “Cabinet meeting – 14th April 2011 – Election Special Edition – Part 2 – NHS questions”

In conclusion he said that change was the only constant, stressed the importance of the Health and Wellbeing Board, said that there was a constant focus on interagency working and that the footprint (meaning the population a hospital served) would be changing.

Cllr Green spoke about the partnership work and referred to his role as a hospital governor. He asked in regards to a cottage hospital why a large footprint was required to provide a quality service? Mr. Richards replied that a sufficient population base with the right amount of patients was required for a higher quality of outcome. He said unlike decades ago that general physicians were not employed now by a District General Hospital. Instead doctors were cardiologists, gastroenterologists, specialist diabetic doctors etc. Even in cardiology, doctors focussed on certain types of heart conditions. In order to keep up their level of expertise these doctors needed to see numbers of patients that were more if a hospital served a population of greater than 250,000 for example the Wirral and Cheshire population. Wirral and Cheshire share a renal and dermatology service. Looking at specialist cardiology, there had to be a balance between access to services at a local level and quality of service. In this area the vast majority were seen in an outpatient setting.

Cllr Rennie asked about the high number of stillbirths reported in the media and what WUTH was doing about this. The answer was that they employed CHKS to compare their clinical data to a peer group of other hospital trusts of a similar size. WUTH was in the top quartile and the issues they were not performing as well on compared to other trusts were organisational things. For example the length of hospital stays and their rates of day cases were lower. He said the Maternity Hospital was in the top 10.

Cabinet meeting – 14th April 2011 – Election Special Edition – Part 1

Tonight you could tell an election was in the air as Cllr Green joked with Cllr Clarke over leaflet deliveries, a sense of de ja vu as Cllr Kelly returns to the Cabinet and some surreal humour about dreams as well as a good smattering that has at times been missing from previous (sometimes lengthy) Cabinet meetings.

Declarations of Interests:-

Cllr Elderton declared a personal and prejudicial interest in item 26. Cllr Lewis declared a personal interest in item 27 as a resident of New Brighton. Cllr Green declared an interest as a hospital governor.

The Cabinet then received a short presentation from Mr. Richards regarding the opportunities and challenges for Wirral University Teaching Hospital. He drew on his more than 5 years experience as Chief Exec and described what the Wirral Excellence in Healthcare System regarding patient centred changed was, their IT system Wirral Millennium and detail about electronic health records. He talked about collaboration with the Countess of Chester hospital and the use of the various sites – St. Catherines, Victoria Central Hospital, GPs and local authority premises.

He then went on to talk about the challenges facing the NHS ranging from length of stay and Social services, re-admissions, infection control, the patient experience and specialisation. He explained the challenges they face from their regulators Monitor and the Care Quality Commission (who carry out unannounced visits). On the financial side he explained how they aim to make savings of £42 million over the next 3 years and the effect that the GP consortia and Health & Wellbeing Board will have.

Cabinet meeting (Wirral Council) 22/02/2011 Part 1 – the Conservative/Lib Dem budget cometh and Labour is not happy

Well yesterday the Conservative & Lib Dem Cabinet “unveiled” their Wirral Council budget for 2011/2012. Labour’s (opposition) budget will arrive by noon on Friday the 25th February.

Next Monday (1st March) the full Council will vote on the budget, although with 41 (yes I know it’s 42 including the Lib Dem Mayor but generally he doesn’t vote as he’s supposed to be politically neutral as part of his office) “progressive partnership” councillors to Labour’s 25 24 (edit – I sometimes forget Cllr. Knowles had switched from Labour to Tory and the independent Cllr Kirwan isn’t still with Wirral Council) councillors, I’m sure even Labour can do the maths and realise Labour’s budget will be defeated next Monday (with no need for Budget Part 2 on the evening of the 9th March) by around seventeen votes.

Can you see which bits of the Budget are from the Lib Dem side and which from the Conservative side? Yes you can see “the seams” between the two halves as we continue to be two independent political parties with minds and policy making processes of our own. If you look really hard you can see the bits influenced by yours truly and others (for example the 4-year rolling programme for 20 mph residential zones discussed last year by the party when Cllr Quinn was Cabinet Member for Streetscene and Transport) now carried forward by Cllr Rennie.

One Lib Dem policy coming into play is the pupil premium which means about £5 million extra for Wirral Schools to spend on children on free school meals, looked after children and service children. You should’ve heard the “wails of anguish” at the Wirral Schools Forum from headmasters/headmistresses from the more prosperous parts of the Borough when they realised £5 million would be spent on improving the educational chances of the most needy! Clearly Wirral is a place of large social divides and the extra money will be a welcome boost to the schools in Bidston & St. James.

So what may you ask is “in the budget”? Well, first to deal with the elements of the council tax that are made up by Merseyside Police’s budget and Merseyside Fire & Rescue Service’s budget. Both Merseyside Police and Merseyside Fire & Rescue Service froze their contributions from Council Tax compared to last year (2010/2011).

Due to increased costs and inflation (as well as a high proportion of its costs being on staff), Merseyside Fire & Rescue Service will be cutting some jobs. Their Chief Exec/treasurer explains the situation in a self-styled “podcast” (I don’t think he quite knows what a podcast is but I have to give them a few marks for trying), which unfortunately with my browser Firefox either opens a blank black window or six video windows of him at once creating an echo effect so I’ve uploaded it to Youtube (which has slightly better audio quality than five echoes).

For the purposes of any copyright lawyers out there, as the work has been made previously available to the public (and still is on Merseyside Fire & Rescue Service’s website at this location), this is classed as “fair dealing” under s.30 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 and is being done for the purpose of news reporting (and making sure you can hear what the speaker says).

Quite why councillors on Merseyside Fire & Rescue Service left it to an officer to record a video to explain the cuts is a mystery I’m sure my humble readers can enlighten me on in the comments section (or maybe I’ll just ask Cllr Ellis, Cllr Niblock, Cllr Rennie or Cllr Roberts next time I see them).

Arrowe Park & Clatterbridge closed to visitors (again)

Due to another outbreak of the norovirus, visiting has once again been suspended. This also affects Clatterbridge hospital (with the exception of the Clatterbridge Centre for Oncology).

Dr Katy Kidd, director of infection control said: “Anyone who suspects they may have norovirus, or has been in contact with someone who has it, should not visit local hospitals, GP surgeries or care homes. People should not go back to work until 48 hours after the symptoms have settled to avoid the spread.”

The situation will be reassessed at 5pm, on Monday, January 31.