Officer presentation on Developing Health and Care Services in Dulwich.
Minutes:
Malcolm Hines, Chief Financial Officer, NHS Southwark introduced himself and representatives of NHS Southwark who were in attendance; a non executive member, a local resident, a project officer and the outreach community engagement officer.
Introduction:
Malcolm talked about the ‘Transforming Southwark NHS’ consultation which took place in 2009 and was presented to this community council as part of the consultation. The process also involved four locality workshops in 2010.
Key change:
The key change was more involvement and leadership. The local health services reforms are going through Parliament at the moment which would give more power to GPs. The consultation on this has already started. The project board is in place and chaired by non executive member, Robert Park and board members include those that are general practioners.
The board would engage and receive feedback to meet different people’s requirements - the majority of these would be held in Dulwich.
The board are also looking at a community engagement plan. Malcolm explained that any person involved in a voluntary, disabilities, or pensioner group they were encouraged to contact the representatives above.
Consultation:
The first stage of the consultation was to look at the clinical model, feedback on the outcome and reach an agreement on the clinical model to improve health services. This would include a new health facility in south of the borough that would have 21st century top quality care. The strategic planning document should be available in the summer.
The second stage of the consultation would involve the outcome of discussion on the clinical model, discuss the future of the Dulwich hospital site, and the best options for this. Formal consultation would be taken up in late 2012. This would form part of a ‘business case’ to the London Health Authority.
It was noted that an announcement and launch (drop in) event would take place on 8 February 2012 between 3 – 7pm at Dulwich Hospital. At the event people were encouraged to be part of the project board so it is fully representative and could help form the business case.
The Dulwich hospital site is currently owned by Southwark Primary Care Trust. Discussions are ongoing what would happen to the ownership of the site after 2013.
Robert explained that the board would look at the range of services in the Dulwich locality and what they could deliver. If the whole site is not used the remaining would be offered out to the public sector.
Malcolm mentioned that they would be looking at short term uses and they are willing to discuss with people what actually would be feasible and look at reasonable proposals as the NHS budget had significantly been reduced. A possibility is to retrench some of the services to reduce the overheads of the site.
Malcolm advised that a briefing document would be published shortly that would indicate areas where there is a need for improvement e.g. primary care and diagnostic services. The board were asked to recognise and consider the problems of the boundary because some Lambeth patients that use the Dulwich hospital site.
The officer took this on board.