Future Fit: How the hospitals could look

The preferred Future Fit option which has been put forward by Shropshire and Telford & Wrekin clinical commissioning groups includes siting the county’s emergency department at Royal Shrewsbury Hospital.

Under that model, Telford’s Princess Royal Hospital would take on responsibility for providing planned care.

The second option would be for Princess Royal Hospital to house Shropshire’s emergency department and for Royal Shrewsbury Hospital to become the planned care site. Both hospitals would have an urgent care centre that would be open 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Health bosses have said that consultant-led women and children’s services would have to be on the same site as the emergency department.

Staffing levels

However, a range of women and children’s services would still be available on the other site, including a midwife-led unit.

Doctors based at the hospitals have previously said that “doing nothing is not an option” and that services need to be changed to make the hospitals sustainable for the future.

Staffing levels at both hospitals also remain an issue and chiefs hope changes will make it easier to recruit and keep staff.

Health chiefs say that people will still be able to express ideas and offer up potential solutions.

People will be asked to consider the impact any potential changes will have on them so a decision can be made on whether any further impact assessments need to be carried out.

Timeline of events leading to decision

2013: It is announced that there will be a change to health services in the county.

January 30, 2014: Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust board (SaTH) is due to approve the plan for the redesign of how services are delivered in Shropshire, Telford & Wrekin and Mid Wales.

February 24, 2014: NHS bosses set aside £1.145 million for the delivery of the Future Fit programme to redesign the way services are delivered.

March 14, 2014: It is announced that Shropshire is to have just one A&E department.

June 20, 2014: The Future Fit blueprint is backed unanimously by the joint health overview and scrutiny committee of Shropshire Council and Telford & Wrekin Council.

September 5, 2014: The two-year operating plan published by SaTH suggests one single A&E unit in a new purpose built hospital is the only way to go.

September 12, 2014: Councillors in Telford & Wrekin call for Secretary of State for Health Jeremy Hunt to intervene and end uncertainty over the future of A&E services.

September 25, 2014: Shadow Health Secretary Andy Burnham says concentrating A&E services in Shropshire on one site could be “dangerous”.

September 26, 2014: Eight options are drawn up as part of the Future Fit programme and presented to SaTH.

September 23, 2015: Mike Sharon, programme director of Future Fit, tells Telford & Wrekin CCG proposals for a single hospital have been deemed unaffordable.

October 1, 2015: The decision is put back, possibly until summer 2016.

November 16, 2015: Dr Caron Morton resigns as accountable officer for Shropshire CCG.

November 25, 2015: Dr Bill Gowans resigns from the board of Shropshire’s CCG.

December 5, 2015: Telford & Wrekin Council launches campaign to keep A&E in Telford.

December 9, 2015: SaTH says a decision will be made in June 2017.

April 12, 2016: GPs describe plans to reorganise Shropshire health services as “naive to the point of being dangerous”.

October 1, 2016: Hundreds of people turn out to protest against threats to health services at PRH. A march takes place from Wellington town centre to the hospital.

November 25, 2016: Jeremy Corbyn wades into the row over the future of A&E services in Shropshire, saying both departments must remain open.

December 12, 2016: Members of Shropshire and Telford & Wrekin clinical commissioning groups vote not to accept recommendations made by the NHS Future Fit board. The plan is referred back to the board for further work on the plans.

August 5, 2017: A report into the Future Fit review warns the money may not be there to make proposed changes a reality.

August 10, 2017: NHS Shropshire and Telford and Wrekin Clinical Commissioning Groups’ Future Fit joint committee agree on its preferred option of siting emergency care for the county at the RSH.

February 27, 2018: Telford & Wrekin Council leader Shaun Davies says he wants assurances that the threatened overnight closure of Telford’s A&E is not a back-door way of bringing in Future Fit.

March 21, 2018: Shrewsbury and Atcham MP Daniel Kawczynski calls in the House of Commons for Theresa May to help get the long-delayed Future Fit process moving.

March 27, 2018: Funding is given the go-ahead.