Patients getting 'second class service', says MP (From Bucks Free Press)
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Thames Valley patients getting 'second class service', says Dr Phillip Lee
1:46pm Thursday 13th September 2012 in News By Lawrence Dunhill
Patients getting 'second class service', says MP
PATIENTS in the Thames Valley region have inherited a hospital network which is ‘unfit for the 21st century’ - an MP told a meeting in Marlow.
With its abundance of motorways and railways, Dr Phillip Lee believes it’s a "disgrace" the region has no primary trauma centre - with most patients having to travel to Oxford following a major accident.
The Bracknell MP made the comments in Marlow on Friday as he presented his radical plans for a ‘super hospital’ at Junction 8/9 of the M4 motorway, in the Maidenhead constituency (see related links).
He blamed the state of the current hospital network on a lack national strategy in planning NHS services over several decades – meaning dozens of major hospitals have been built and expanded in the wrong locations in a "make-do-and-mend" approach.
Dr Lee said Stoke Mandeville was a prime example of this - gradually growing into a major acute site having starting out as an emergency military hospital in the 1940s.
Wexham Park Hospital was built in the 1960s after a farmer gifted the site to the NHS, but has always struggled to serve the population it was intended for, he added.
Asked about Amersham Hospital, Dr Lee said: "I wasn’t alone in thinking that shouldn’t have been built in the first place.... It’s a lovely facility, yet again in the wrong location. I found it inexplicable."
He believes patients in the Thames Valley are often getting a ‘second-class service’ and admitted he recently stopped his father undergoing an operation at Wexham Park Hospital, just north of Slough.
He told Friday’s meeting: "He was down to have a big vascular operation but I didn’t want my father done at Wexham Park. I got him an operation at a vascular centre....
"So why should I expect you guys to get a second class service? If you had a super hospital it could afford a vascular centre, it would be big enough."
Dr Lee argued that closing old hospitals and building new ones in better locations will save lives and improve care, adding: "The reality is if you’re sick you want to go to a specialist centre.
"When you are actually ill the last place on earth I would suggest you would want to go is a poorly staffed district general hospital."
Dad Tony Lee, 66, who lives in Bourne End, told the Bucks Free Press he ended up having the operation at St Mary’s Hospital in Paddington.
Dr Lee’s plans would require the closure and sale of hospital sites such as Wexham Park and Heatherwood, along with a further scaling back of services at other hospitals including Wycombe.
They have been described as "pie in the sky" by some, but Dr Lee insists they are realistic - adding there is a 17-acre site available in his preferred location at Junction 8/9 of the M4.
The Conservative backbencher, who is also a practising GP, went to school in Marlow and has worked at about 50 doctors’ surgeries across the Thames Valley, as well as at Wycombe and Stoke Mandeville hospitals.
Comments(12)
QualityCare4all
says...
6:48pm Thu 13 Sep 12
What evidence does he have that a super hospital would be better?
Come on Dr Lee....tell us please.
Do the people of Buckinghamshire want a 'super' hospital miles away that has no local accountability?
I dont think so!
sparky49
says...
8:03pm Thu 13 Sep 12
QualityCare4all wrote:Second class health care is all around us when ever there is a Tory government. They hate the NHS and will do all they can to dismantle it. Remember the 80's patients dying on trolleys in corridors.
What evidence does Dr Lee have about thjis 'second class' healtrhcare we are getting in the Thames Valley. How is he measuring the quality? Is he talking about hospital care, Mental health services, GP services or community services?
What evidence does he have that a super hospital would be better?
Come on Dr Lee....tell us please.
Do the people of Buckinghamshire want a 'super' hospital miles away that has no local accountability?
I dont think so!
geoffW
says...
6:08am Fri 14 Sep 12
sparky49 wrote:... and the gradual closure of Wycombe hospital continued apace under a Labour government.
QualityCare4all wrote:Second class health care is all around us when ever there is a Tory government. They hate the NHS and will do all they can to dismantle it. Remember the 80's patients dying on trolleys in corridors.
What evidence does Dr Lee have about thjis 'second class' healtrhcare we are getting in the Thames Valley. How is he measuring the quality? Is he talking about hospital care, Mental health services, GP services or community services?
What evidence does he have that a super hospital would be better?
Come on Dr Lee....tell us please.
Do the people of Buckinghamshire want a 'super' hospital miles away that has no local accountability?
I dont think so!
.
No good trying to play party politics Sparky when they are all as bad as eachother.
Darren Hayday
says...
9:11am Fri 14 Sep 12
geoffW wrote:Amen! They are all very bad and not one of them have helped us in High Wycombe in regards to our hospital.
sparky49 wrote:... and the gradual closure of Wycombe hospital continued apace under a Labour government.
QualityCare4all wrote:Second class health care is all around us when ever there is a Tory government. They hate the NHS and will do all they can to dismantle it. Remember the 80's patients dying on trolleys in corridors.
What evidence does Dr Lee have about thjis 'second class' healtrhcare we are getting in the Thames Valley. How is he measuring the quality? Is he talking about hospital care, Mental health services, GP services or community services?
What evidence does he have that a super hospital would be better?
Come on Dr Lee....tell us please.
Do the people of Buckinghamshire want a 'super' hospital miles away that has no local accountability?
I dont think so!
.
No good trying to play party politics Sparky when they are all as bad as eachother.
demoness the second
says...
11:17am Fri 14 Sep 12
So I wonder whose pocket he is in?
Someone somewhere wants to build a new hospital and make a lot of money doing it.
In the meantime lets all run down the staff of the ones we have in order to discredit them, further demoralise them and generally do as much damage as we can.
BFP you sicken me - you are nothing better than a cheap version of the Daily Star IMO.
tigeran
says...
11:42am Fri 14 Sep 12
sparky49 wrote:Just because under the Tories you will not be given everything for nothing as you seem think you should get Sparky, money doesnt grow on trees, try providing for yourself for a change and stop expecting the state to pay for you!
QualityCare4all wrote:Second class health care is all around us when ever there is a Tory government. They hate the NHS and will do all they can to dismantle it. Remember the 80's patients dying on trolleys in corridors.
What evidence does Dr Lee have about thjis 'second class' healtrhcare we are getting in the Thames Valley. How is he measuring the quality? Is he talking about hospital care, Mental health services, GP services or community services?
What evidence does he have that a super hospital would be better?
Come on Dr Lee....tell us please.
Do the people of Buckinghamshire want a 'super' hospital miles away that has no local accountability?
I dont think so!
tigeran
says...
11:46am Fri 14 Sep 12
sparky49 wrote:Personally I thnk the NHS should be done away with and everyone should have private health cover. Should sort the leaches out!
QualityCare4all wrote:Second class health care is all around us when ever there is a Tory government. They hate the NHS and will do all they can to dismantle it. Remember the 80's patients dying on trolleys in corridors.
What evidence does Dr Lee have about thjis 'second class' healtrhcare we are getting in the Thames Valley. How is he measuring the quality? Is he talking about hospital care, Mental health services, GP services or community services?
What evidence does he have that a super hospital would be better?
Come on Dr Lee....tell us please.
Do the people of Buckinghamshire want a 'super' hospital miles away that has no local accountability?
I dont think so!
Little Lisa
says...
1:16pm Fri 14 Sep 12
I work in the operating theatres at Wycombe hospital and we are all against the new hospital. Obviously we are worried about losing are jobs but there is so such he needs to think about like people who cant drive, single parent that will need to take time off work the take their children to appointment or A&E, the elderly paitent who rely on family to help, also having a hospital that far from Wycombe will mean that more people could die on route. Maybe Dr Lee should have a chat with staff within the Nhs I'm sure we could tell him a few things about what we think.
Darren Hayday
says...
3:57pm Fri 14 Sep 12
demoness the second wrote:Despite the grieve I get from you "Demoness the second", I completely agree with you! (for once!!)
And now Phillip lee apparently has launched a blistering attack on our hospitals.
So I wonder whose pocket he is in?
Someone somewhere wants to build a new hospital and make a lot of money doing it.
In the meantime lets all run down the staff of the ones we have in order to discredit them, further demoralise them and generally do as much damage as we can.
BFP you sicken me - you are nothing better than a cheap version of the Daily Star IMO.
demoness the second
says...
8:40pm Fri 14 Sep 12
Little Lisa wrote:I really wouldn't worry. As a health care worker you know the climate that all of us are in.
Considering Dr Lee has worked in 50 different surgeries around bucks, he can't be very good at his job!!!!
I work in the operating theatres at Wycombe hospital and we are all against the new hospital. Obviously we are worried about losing are jobs but there is so such he needs to think about like people who cant drive, single parent that will need to take time off work the take their children to appointment or A&E, the elderly paitent who rely on family to help, also having a hospital that far from Wycombe will mean that more people could die on route. Maybe Dr Lee should have a chat with staff within the Nhs I'm sure we could tell him a few things about what we think.
There are no resources for a new hospital - it is entirely inappropriate and a lot of planning would have to be made.
The man is full of hot air and ( as I say) I am sure has a big developer behind him who is paying him to diss our local hospitals.
The BFP is encouraging him and should be ashamed of themselves.
DonRockell
says...
6:54pm Sat 15 Sep 12
The move to Stoke is just as bad and people from Marlow and the Hambledon valley dont get any help traveling to Aylesbury nor is there any public transport for the trip either So a Move to Bracknel or Maidenhead / Cox Green where the M4 Junction 8/9 is will actually be a better option
Darren Hayday says...
2:14pm Thu 13 Sep 12
Where do I go if in the middle of the night there is an emergency with my son?
20+ miles away in Bracknell?