Trust explains move to shut Ludlow Hospital ward

Jan Ditheridge, chief executive of the Shropshire Community Health NHS Trust, said consolidating patients and beds on to one floor would help staff and doctors at the hospital.

The trust has shut the Stretton Ward, leaving just the Dinham Ward open for inpatient beds at the hospital, without removing any beds.

It says the move will bring two 12-bedded wards on different floors into one inpatient area, benefitting patients, visitors and staff.

Ms Ditheridge said there were significant issues trying to recruit nurses at community hospitals, which meant patients were more often being cared for by temporary staff.

Speaking during a trust board meeting in Castle Hall, Bridgnorth, she said: "Unless nurses live in and around Ludlow they find it difficult to travel to work, which is not the case as much in Bridgnorth and Whitchurch.

"This has lead us to a critical point because making sure patients are cared for with temporary staff can become a safety risk in itself.

"Nurses end up working harder and there is no continuity in the team.

"We ensured care was not compromised but there was less time to plan for discharging patients and no meaningful interaction with the patients' families.

"Some staff suggested making one ward because it would make it easier for them to support each other rather than on two.

"I would often see on visits to Ludlow one ward was quieter than the other but we could not move staff between the two wards to support each other."

Ms Ditheridge said a risk assessment was carried out to see if the move would have any effect on privacy and it was decided changes would take pressure off staff and reduce the amount of public money spent on agency staff.

"We decided the patients and the public needed to know about these changes so we issued briefing s to the press, patient groups and made phone calls to other interested groups in Ludlow," she said.

"That has carried an enormous amount of concern in the public domain because I do not think people understood why we were doing it.

"We explained it was about patient care and not the beginning of the end for Ludlow Hospital."

Ms Ditheridge said the trust had seen a significant reduction in the number of beds being used in Ludlow and some were regularly empty because more people were being cared for at home.

But she said the beds were also being used for much more complex health needs, which had previously been dealt with in acute hospital, so the need for more nurses had remained. She added that any future plans to permanently close a ward would have a full public consultation.

"We agreed to reduce the number of beds in Ludlow on a non-permanent basis with the understanding that if there was a need for extra capacity going forward we could reopen them," she said.

"Recent bed closures have been scrutinised on a weekly basis and during the winter we reopened five beds when they were needed."

Steve Gregory, director of nursing and operations, said there were no plans to introduce similar ward closures at Bridgnorth, Whitchurch and Bishop's Castle community hospitals because they already provided care on a single floor. He said the reduction in agency spending would also save the trust £250,000, which meant they would not need to find any future savings.

Trust chairman Mike Ridley said the trust was determined to ensure Ludlow Hospital had a future.

"It's every important for us to have a community trust in Shropshire to push for community hospitals to deliver the best possible services," he said.

"We will make savings and try and do all we can to invest in the existing hospitals.

"Money is really tight but there is a commitment from this board to Ludlow Hospital and I really want to see the possibility of it becoming an urgent care centre."