Local residents are being urged to have their say on improving cardiology and ophthalmology in East Sussex through the Sussex Health and Care Partnership’s public consultations.
After a recent extension to the closing date, the consultations are due to end on Friday 11 March 2022 and can both be accessed on the Partnership’s website: https://www.sussexhealthandcare.uk/get-involved/cardiology-ophthalmology-east-sussex.
The proposals in their current form aim to improve the care available in East Sussex and cut waiting times, and they will also help to enable staff to develop their skills and expertise so more patients in the region can benefit from new medical treatments and technologies.
For cardiology, clinicians want to create new cardiac response teams at the emergency departments at the Conquest Hospital and Eastbourne District General Hospital and to concentrate the most highly specialised cardiac services at one of these hospital sites.
For ophthalmology, clinicians want to consolidate the services currently provided at Eastbourne General Hospital, Bexhill Hospital, and the Conquest Hospital into two sites at Eastbourne District General Hospital and Bexhill Hospital. This would enable patients to have quicker access to tests and treatment with more input from the most senior clinicians. It would also enable one-stop clinics, reducing the number of appointments patients need to attend.
Whilst the cardiology and ophthalmology proposals are not linked, they are being run in parallel to make it easier and simpler for people who have an interest in both.
Sally-Ann Hart, MP for Hastings and Rye, commented; “It is crucially important that local people engage with these consultations that are due to close on March 11, 2022, to ensure their voices are heard and that Hastings, Rye, and the surrounding villages are fully and properly taken into consideration when final decisions are made.”
Image Credits: Ralf Roletschek .
When so many of our healthcare services are being based at Eastbourne DGH, this is a very long trek for us over at the other end of the county. I have long feared that the 30 minute “golden period” for treatment in the event of a stroke will have long expired before I am even halfway there. Why are services at the William Harvey at Ashford not part of the healthcare equation – they are both nearer and easier (though none can be described as particularly easy) to access?
I have had to trek to Bexhill Hospital for Eye surgery and Eastbourne Hospital for preliminary Covid tests beforehand and also Bexhill for Assessment of Muscular Pains.
Another recent hearing Assessment meant driving to Eastbourne Park.
All of these would previously be carried out at much more accessable Conquest Hospital. Living outside Rye
with very much reduced bus service which, despite protests, fail to coordinate arrival and departure times
of Southern Rail services from Rye Station
These distant outposts for Conquest may be more convenient for patients based to the West of Hastings but is a travel nightmare for those of us in the East