Summary of Sue Evans` attendance at Patient Forum meeting

held at 2.00pm on 12th April 2011.

Present : Max Cadmore, Stephen Clark, Bernard Evans, Dana Evans, Rita Ford, Gerard Lawler, Janet Lloyd (Chairman) and Roy Nelson.

  • In response to a question about the suspension of the Chief officer on the CHC Sue confirmed that it was decided that the information/statistics about complaints should be put into the public domain. David Sissling (CEO of the ABMU H B) made an official complaint which led to Phil Williams1 suspension. The current deputy CO of the CHC did not wish to take on the CO`s role; it is currently being covered by Carol Lamyman-Jones (Board of the CHCs in Wales). The Powys Health Board has been given the brief to conduct the investigation into Phil Williams` actions.

The members of the Patient Forum expressed considerable concern

about the often quoted independence of the CHCs and feel that this

action calls it into question.

  • A recent WAG initiative required at least 20% number of Practices be surveyed about their appointments systems; these had to be undertaken in a two week period. Six surgeries in Swansea have been sampled with mostly positive responses.
  • The CHC will be conducting another series of visits in July in the hospitals which will be a follow-up from the October 2010 series – these had disappointing results. The hospitals had not carried out any work towards completing their agreed action plans. There had not been any perceived problems in the past about action plans when it had been the Swansea NHS Trust but since the amalgamation matters have been different. When visits are classified as `patient environment led` no advance notice is given to the hospitals – this covers areas such as entrances/corridors/access/ finding wards and patient feeding.
  • The proposed closure of Hill House has not yet gone out to consultation – the stakeholders will be involved first. The Patient Forum asked for clarification as to who actually are the stakeholders.
  • The Patient Forum provided Sue Evans with feedback of the recent visit to the Morriston A&E and the newly relocated GPOOHS. The group had been welcomed by Janet Williams, operations manager, Andy Mcnab, consultant in A&E and Dr. Ashok Rayani, previously CEO of SOS (the GP led previous out of hours service). The visit has lasted about one and a half hours; discussions were open and all questions were answered.

The group had been delighted to note that the newly built facility for the GPOOHS is expected to be operational by mid-May but it was noted that the out of hours service is no longer provided by SOS – the service has been taken in-house. The group asked that this be monitored as the previous service had been excellent and allowed considerable flexibility in `manning` the service to meet the needs of patients. The group felt that answers were hesitant when questions were asked about what scope there would be to bring in extra GPs when the service was experiencing unusually high demand.

The group viewed the new plans for the expansion of the A&E facilities which if approved could be operational within two years. Andy Mcnab explained the problems which Morriston is experiencing in appointing new/additional doctors; interviews had recently been held but applications remain disappointingly low. Some areas in medicine are not seen as attractive career pathways.

  • GL asked the CHC to review the new hospital appointment system – it is fully automated and he considers that it is not patient friendly. He stated that it had taken much button pressing and patience before he eventually spoke with a human. RF added that multiple letters were still being sent for a single appointment. Sue advised that she would ask a CHC group to investigate.

This part of the meeting closed at 3.20pm