Decision around Epsom hospital - key meeting Friday 3 July

Dear members & supporters, I have just received this email in my role as a Borough Councillor - thought many of you would be interested.

David

From: SURREYHEARTLANDSCCGS, Comms (NHS NORTH WEST SURREY CCG) <comms.surreyheartlandsccgs@nhs.net>
Date: 26 June 2020 at 12:01:00 BST
Subject: IHT Update: Health leaders set to decide on investing £500 million in new hospital and existing buildings


Health leaders set to decide on investing £500 million in new hospital and existing buildings

Dear colleague,

We are writing to let you know that next week health leaders are set to make a decision on proposals to invest £500 million to improve hospitals for more than 700,000 people in Surrey, Sutton, and Merton.

The governing bodies of NHS South West London and NHS Surrey Heartlands Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) will meet virtually due to coronavirus social distancing rules on Friday 3 July 2020 11.00am - 2.00pm<https://improvinghealthcaretogether.org.uk/next-steps/improving-healthcare-together-committees-in-common-friday-3-july-2020/> to decide whether to locate the new specialist emergency care hospital on the Epsom, St Helier or Sutton hospital sites. They are considering feedback from the public consultation which ran from 8 January to 1 April this year alongside all other evidence which is included in the decision-making business case.

Today we have published the decision- making business case which is available along with the meeting agenda on the Improving Healthcare Together website here<https://improvinghealthcaretogether.org.uk/document/draft-decision-making-business-case/>. This follows our recent publication of independent analysis of the feedback<https://improvinghealthcaretogether.org.uk/document/independent-analysis-of-feedback-from-consultation-report/> received during the public consultation which can be found here<https://improvinghealthcaretogether.org.uk/document/independent-analysis-of-feedback-from-consultation-report/>. This revealed that on balance across all strands of the consultation Sutton received more support as the preferred site for the new facility.

Under the CCGs' proposals, the majority of people will see no change to where they receive their hospital care but would be treated in buildings that meet 21st century healthcare standards.

The plans include bringing six core services together for the sickest patients needing more specialist care and births in hospital on one site in a new purpose-built specialist emergency care hospital. This will enable the hospitals to meet clinical standards and improve the quality and outcome of care for all residents.
Regardless of where the new hospital is located, at least £80 million would be invested in Epsom and St Helier Hospitals, which would retain the majority of services and be open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year with urgent treatment centres operating at both.

Given the current circumstances, it feels more important than ever that we continue this programme to secure the right healthcare services for local people. We have an opportunity to build a state-of-the-art hospital with more single rooms for better infection control housing a range of specialists working together which will benefit patients every day.

Members of the public, who will be able to watch the Committees in Common meeting via a link that will be published on Wednesday 1 July the Improving Healthcare Together website, and have until 12 midday on Wednesday 1 July to submit a question to the panel relating to items on the agenda that has just been published here<https://improvinghealthcaretogether.org.uk/next-steps/improving-healthcare-together-committees-in-common-friday-3-july-2020/> on the website. Members of the public can submit questions by:

* Emailing: hello@improvinghealthcaretogether.org.uk<mailto:hello@improvinghealthcaretogether.org.uk>
* Calling: 020 3880 0271
* Texting: 07500 063 191

All questions received will be shared with Committees in Common members and published on the IHT website in advance of the meeting. The questions received will be clustered by theme. The Committees in Common Convenor will select a question from each cluster that is most representative of the issues. Only one question would be selected from any individual or on behalf of any organisation to allow the consideration of as many questions as possible within the time allocated.

We have also invited local politicians, local authority representatives and Keep Our St Helier Hospital to share with us any final written statements including any additional information which was not previously submitted as part of their original responses to the public consultation. The deadline for statements is 12 midday on Wednesday 1 July and should be sent to hello@improvinghealthcaretogether.org.uk<mailto:hello@improvinghealthcaretogether.org.uk>. Any written statements received will be published on our website in preparation for the meeting.
It is important to stress that under any of the proposals most services will stay where they are now and once a final decision is made there will be at least five years to work with communities to ensure the newly built and refurbished existing hospitals work seamlessly together.

We are grateful to everyone who took part in our consultation - we have and will look at all those views and all the evidence to help us make this hugely important decision on 3 July.
Yours sincerely,

Dr Andrew Murray, GP and Clinical Chair at NHS South West London CCG,

Dr Charlotte Canniff, GP and Clinical Chair at NHS Surrey Heartlands CCG.