Trust Board Febuary 2010 - Sandwell & West Birmingham Hospitals

SWBTB (2/10) 035 (a)
6.2 Sandwell LINks Health Subgroup (LINks) in their formal response to the consultation
recommended that:
“The transport needs of Sandwell women receiving services from City Hospital needs greater
consideration, especially for those who are classified as high risk. Changes that take place now
should be sustainable after the opening of the new hospital in 2015. If option 3 is selected as
the best option then it must be ensured that the stand alone unit is in a central point and have
good transportation links.”
In their response LINks also raises a number of concerns (which along with the
recommendations can be found in full at appendix 6) namely:
o The impact moving services will have on the morale of both staff and Sandwell as
a town.
o About what support would be put in place in terms of transport – particularly for
“those women who were considered to be at risk.”
o These are interim proposals does this mean that services would change again
after 2015.
In addition to these concerns the response also notes that for some Sandwell residents City
Hospital is closer than Sandwell.
6.3 The Joint Health Scrutiny Committee through the minutes of their meeting on 7 th
January 2010 made the following resolution:
“Whilst the Joint Committee would ideally have preferred that full maternity provision would
remain at Sandwell, in light of the evidence which it had received regarding maternity services it
supported the adoption of Option 3 of the public consultation document “Improving services for
giving birth” which is “temporarily relocate all births (normal and complicated) to City Hospital
and then set up a Community Birth Centre in Sandwell that is not attached to a hospital site”
with the with the caveat that the Midwife-led Birth Centre be built and be operational in
Sandwell before maternity services are withdrawn from Sandwell Hospital.”
The resolution (which can be found in full at appendix 7) also goes on to say that if this
resolution is not supported by the Board of Sandwell PCT, the Joint Committee “is minded to
refer the matter to the Sectary of State for Health” and identifies the grounds on which it would
do so.
6.4 Other Stakeholders – Sandwell
The Public and Patient Involvement team at Sandwell PCT provided questions and comments
sheets from presentations given to the following:
• Community Health Network.
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