£100m for healthcare shake-up

Jul 18 2007 by Alan Weston, Liverpool Daily Post

LIVERPOOL is to recruit 200 more health care staff and invest £100m as part of the biggest NHS shake-up the city has ever seen.

The aim of the strategy is to offer more care closer to people’s homes, and to ensure patients only go to hospital when absolutely necessary.

Under the plans launched yesterday, three new “treatment centres” providing round-the-clock care will be opened, along with neighbourhood health centres in state-of-the-art buildings, and an expansion of individual GP surgeries.

Liverpool primary care trust (PCT) is believed to be the first in the country to be setting up the new system, which aims to provide “joined-up” health care services over the next seven years.

The PCT said the £100m would be used to invest in new or refurbished buildings and hundreds more clinical staff, starting with the recruitment of 200 extra doctors, nurses and other health care staff.

The programme, called A New Health Service for Liverpool, is the result of five years’ planning and consultation.

The PCT said the three new treatment centres would provide minor surgery and out-patient services, leaving hospitals free to concentrate on accident and emergency and major surgery.

The first will be on the site of the Sir Alfred Jones Memorial Hospital in Garston, with up to £10m being invested in a refurbished or new building to be completed by 2009.

Two more will follow, in the north of the city by 2010, and in the east a year later.

In addition, the PCT has signalled the end of the run-down terraced house surgery, with up to 25 neighbourhood health centres which will be open for longer and housed in high-quality buildings.

The centres are being set up instead of the planned “super surgeries”, which were shelved after attracting little support.

The final part of the three-tier approach will involve the expansion of individual GP practices, to ensure that every patient in Liverpool will be able to see a GP within a 15-minute walk.

A meeting of GPs this week indicated around 70% support for the scheme.

Dr John Hussey, chair of Liverpool PCT’s Professional Executive Committee, said: “Liverpool clinicians have been involved closely in the debate about the future of primary care and have given widespread support for these ambitious proposals.”

Derek Campbell, chief executive of Liverpool PCT, said: “We are moving health care out of the hospitals, and into people’s homes and communities.

“I believe we are two to three years ahead of the rest of the country in this. It is unacceptable that people can’t see a GP on a Saturday or at other times outside of their working hours.

“We have set out the principles for how these changes can be delivered and have found the money to do it.”

Gideon Ben-Tovim, chair of Liverpool PCT said: “This is a huge investment that will transform health care in Liverpool.

“In committing £100m for new facilities, plus annual running costs of £30m, this investment is the equivalent of building a new hospital in the city.”

Further consultation with health professionals will now take place, with final proposals due to be ready by the end of September.

alanweston@dailypost.co.uk