A DRASTIC plan by Northern, Eastern and Western Devon Clinical Commissioning Group (NEW Devon CCG) and South Devon and Torbay CCG to remodel health services in the county to make big savings, could have an adverse effect on community hospitals in the West Devon area.

A draft of the CCG’s Wider Devon Sustainability and Transformation plan (STP), which proposes how local health services will change in an effort to become sustainable and is set to be rolled out in April next year, has leaked.

The document outlines plans to reduce the number of Devon hospitals offering acute and specialist services. Nearly 600 acute hospital beds in the county could be removed.

The draft suggests that current investment in community beds should be cut in favour of community centred care built around the idea of treating patients at home in their own beds. Quite the effect such proposals will have on community hospitals like Okehampton is currently unclear.

The STP was submitted to NHS England on June 30 and is one of 44 such plans being submitted across the country. It is thought the Devon plan could be among the most drastic in an attempt to tackle overspending.

The STP report has been written by Angela Pedder, who is the lead chief executive for the STP and Success Regime in Devon. She said: ‘Both CCGs have identified the challenges facing the health system in Devon and the need for change.

‘The NHS and local authorities as a whole system are now working together to improve care through more integrated and locally tailored service and our plans will be formally communicated through the next version of the STP when it is published.’

In a statement responding to the leaks, NEW Devon CCG said the draft was ‘a work in progress’ and ‘more analysis and consideration’ needed to be undertaken before the work was complete.

The statement said: ‘The STP creates the opportunity for health and local authorities to work together and formulate plans to improve and secure the sustainability of services we deliver to people across Devon.

‘This is a positive process that builds on work already undertaken building on engagement and feedback from members of the public, patients and other stakeholders by the North, East and West Devon Success Regime in the Case for Change, which was published in February 2016.  South Devon and Torbay CCG’s Case for Change was published on September 1, 2016.

‘Each STP area is responsible for engaging local people and stakeholders on their draft proposals. No changes to the services people currently receive will be made without local engagement and, where required, consultation. There are longstanding assurance processes in place to make sure this happens.

‘Engagement events have been held over the summer and will continue as the process of developing our STP continues. We will be talking to the public and stakeholders regularly about the main themes from the plan and this has helped shape our early thinking. 

‘We have been very open with people in both case for change documents about the scale of challenge our health and social care system faces and also the opportunities for improvement that exist. Clinical and financial sustainability has to be achieved alongside improvements in health and wellbeing for the people across Devon.

‘The programme of work to review acute and specialised service across Devon will commence in October.’

A further submission will be made in October and the CCG will follow the nationally agreed timetable for publication of the STP document.

West Devon Borough and Okehampton Town councillor Tony Leech said: ‘When we hear from almost every organisation that they are either running out of money or will be bankrupt within a few years due to austerity and indeed due to changes made by central government, we must start to ask when enough is enough.

‘I do however agree that integrating all healtcare has to be the way forward. We have gone too long without fully joined up thinking, and this can be seen today with the bed blocking nationally.

‘Along with others, I attended a ‘seminar’ / consultation event in Okehampton, set up by NHS England, to discuss the proposed changes and to put forward our views on how this should go out to consultation.

‘We were told that there are three counties that have been put into what can only be seen as special measures due to the chronic overspends.

‘Essex, Cumbria and Devon have to put into place measures to reduce their overspends as quickly as possible and the thinking is that by closing beds, it will release money that can then be spent on care for patients within their own homes.

‘A doctor from North Devon said that keeping patients in hospital longer than absolutely necessary, is actually detrimental to their health, and people prefer to be at home when they can. I can’t contradict this, as it seems that infections are rife in hospital and the longer we stay in bed, the more muscle power we lose.

‘So how safe is it for patients to be sent home? No one seems to know. It is clear that everyone should be assessed individually and has a specific care package in place before being released from hospital. From anecdotal evidence at the moment, this is not happening now, so how can we guarantee that it will happen after the changes have taken place? We can’t.

‘The Royal Devon and Exeter Hospital has been in the red for at least 28 straight months as far as bed blocking is concerned and why is this?

‘It seems to me it is because the local Devon County Council care homes have all been closed, as have a number of NHS/clinical commissioning groups, local hospitals, plus the fact that the private care homes are closing daily due to the lack of funding that they receive, so who on earth would think that closing even more of the remaining bed provision will actually make it better?

‘Should this new NHS England/CCG proposal go forward and it goes wrong, then people could die. A bit of a strong statement, but it is a fact. What happens to those who live on their own, or do not have family living locally who can help?

‘Loneliness, isolation, stress and depression can cause as many problems as the patient’s original aliments and could have serious consequences.

‘The new proposal is looking to use more and more volunteers to assist the process. How will this work when the main provider is a contractor?

‘The CCGs bid for the contracts, and the community are now being asked to volunteer to help them do their work free of charge? I don’t think so. One of the main reasons for all our woes within the NHS, is the rampant and almost clandestine privatisation that has gone on to date.

‘Our governments seem to think that if it is all privatised or contracted out, then it is someone else’s responsibility to actually train the doctors, nurses and all the other specialists within our NHS.

The last reorganisation of the NHS was, to my mind, the final straw.

‘NHS England and the myriad of CCGs has now become so complicated that no one seems to know who is responsible for what, and the bureaucracy seems have got worse rather than better.

‘And finally, when this NHS proposal comes out for consultation, I would press everyone to get involved in the process.

‘I have to say that I believe that this is yet another done deal, as was the closure of the Okement Surgery, the closure of the minor injuries unit and the changes in the Devon Doctors Services here in Okehampton, all done without any consultation, but there has to be a better solution to the NHS dilemma than what is being proposed at this time.’