Doctors pledge their support for Whipps campaign

[By Jonathan Bunn. This article is reprinted with kind permission from the 23 November issue of the Waltham Forest Guardian.

21 November. sGeneral practitioners and consultants have pledged their support for maintaining a full range of services at Whipps Cross University Hospital.

Senior doctors based at the hospital joined around 40 GPs from across north east London at the Medical Education Centre on Tuesay to discuss the planned shake-up of health services in the area under the Fit for the Future programme.

A motion to support the campaign to keep Whipps Cross as a district general hospital was passed unanimously.

Dr Sanjoy Kuymar, of the Larkshall Medical Centre in Chingford, has distributed a petition to GPs opposing a proposal to downgrade the hospital and has expressed concern that community-based facilities cannot support the expected increase in demand.

Explaining why the meeting was called, he said: "We wanted to get a feel for what the consultants were thinking about the proposals and there is a consensus between us.

To be fair to all parties, we know the hospital is in financial difficulties and a lot of work needs to be done. We admit there are problems, but when the dust settles, we want to get the best serices for the local community and tht can only be achieved by having a district general hospital."

Dr Kumar also questioned the Fit for the Future process, saying GPs had not been involved enough in the pre-consultationprocess.

He said: "I am surprised that GPs, who deal directly with patients, are not considered stakeholders.

"We are meant to run the Government's Choose and Book initiative - we choose which hospital to send patients to.

"We do not have the capacity in the community to support the changes being proposed."

Local Primary Care Trusts say they will be investing millions of pounds into community-based services.