I?AM dismayed by the proposed withdrawal in October of the out of hours medical service from Tavistock Hospital by the NEW Clinical Commissioning Group. 

This fundamental change has been slipped through without consultation with the general practitioners and West Devon Borough Council, let alone the people of West Devon.

It seems that they say that the higher number of treatment centres than other CCGs was one of the reasons. Surely this is because Devon is the second largest county in England and so should have a higher number of treatment centres?

I was a general practitioner in Tavistock for 25 years and was consistently busy when on call on a Sunday morning. Up until now there have been two doctors working from Tavistock Hospital on Sunday mornings. This will be replaced by none in October. This seems bizarre.

There is nothing to find on the CCG’s website and we need urgent explanation about what will be proposed and why. For instance will there be a doctor at Okehampton during the evenings on a weekday and how long on at a weekend? We need to be told all about their proposed changes.

Dr Rupert Gude

Whitchurch

I WAS delighted to see that the cuts imposed on the GP out of hours service at Tavistock Hospital made the front page of last week’s edition.

I was less impressed by the response to the concerns of many residents you had reported. A ‘spokesman’ stated that the design of the new service arose from ‘a review of the current usage of out of hours service’ that had been undertaken.

The data from this review has never been made public. What period of time was taken? How does the data compare to the same periods over the past ten years? Was the period of time chosen typical of the usual level of activity throughout that year, or reflect the average in that period over the last ten years?

When we are told the budget remains the same and has not been cut, is this true of both services Devon Doctors are now required to supply?

From this ‘study’ many cuts are being imposed without any public consultation and are justified with aspirations presented as facts. Given the numerous failures of new technology to deliver the efficiency improvements promised, the launch of new services such as ‘interactive voice response technology’ fails to reassure - as does the clichéd promise of a ‘more joined up service’.

All of these plans we are told were put before the Devon Scrutiny Committee in a ‘closed briefing’ in June. I take it that a ‘closed’ briefing is one that is not subject to any public scrutiny at all. I hope the Tavistock Times will continue to argue for more consultation with local residents before these cuts are imposed as I believe we are all entitled to a little more scrutiny than that.

Mike Sainsbury

Whitchurch