9:57am Friday 9th February 2007
By Mikarla Marsden
South Essex could be left with a single Accident and Emergency department if too many people choose to go to NHS-funded private clinics, it has been warned.
Marlene Moura, chairman of the patient and public involvement forum for Basildon Hospital, said a secret hospital report suggested it may have to merge services with Southend if funding dropped below a certain level.
Mrs Moura said: "If 15 per cent of finances and patients are removed from the hospitals, we could end up with one hospital. A&E would be the first to feel it."
Mrs Moura said patients choosing to seek private treatment outside the hospital, at centres such as the proposed mini-hospital at Basildon's Festival Leisure Park, would take money from the main hospitals and cause services to be scaled down as a result.
She said: "I'm really worried. They're allowing this new mini-hospital to go ahead, which will take out huge amounts of services for our hospitals."
A separate report, released by the NHS in December, suggests hospitals of the size of Basildon and Southend are being encouraged to combine their emergency services.
The report, called Looking to the Future: Development of hospital services in the East of England, states: "It must be questionable whether units serving a catchment population below 300,000 can or should continue to plan to provide these services on their own.
"At a minimum, they should look to form strategic partnerships or clinical networks with adjacent providers such that the combined catchment population exceeds 300,000.
"Ideally, the combined catchment population should be greater than 500,000."
Both hospitals just scrape over the 300,000 mark in terms of patients they provide services for.
Southend Hospital, which caters to Southend, Rochford and Castle Point patients, covers a population of about 320,000. Basildon Hospital, which takes in Basildon and Thurrock areas, covers about 310,000.
A spokesman for Basildon Hospital confirmed they were also worried about the "knock-on effects" for emergency services and said some services may be lost if the majority of patients chose to go private.
Basildon Hospital chairman David Hooper estimated about £11million funding would be at risk if patients were treated at the planned mini hospital instead.
He said: "Although this is the worst-case scenario, even smaller numbers of patient treatments transferring from this trust will create significant financial and service risks for the trust."
Southend Hospital, meanwhile, seemed unfazed by Ms Moura's merger warning.
A hospital spokesman said its A&E services were not under any threat.
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