DEFEND THE WHITTINGTON HOSPITAL COALITION

defendwhittington@gmail.com

Questions for the Board of the Whittington Hospital

1. What is the deadline for the Foundation Trust application?
2. When will you be presenting the application to the Board?
3. In the April edition of Board Matters you describe the Trust as having a healthy surplus. Why, therefore are you making cuts to our Hospital?
4. In a previous document, you claim that the surplus is due to savings through “efficiencies”. What have you already cut to achieve savings?
5. Why did the Board not resign when the Budget was cut showing their commitment to a fully-funded hospital, since this cut disabled the full functioning of our local hospital?
6. What is the cost of the Board’s Open days and “Discussion” evenings to promote the sell-off plans?
   1. Has the Board developed a model for transference of hospital to community care?
   2. How is the Transforming the Patient Experience going to benefit patients?
   3. How is the Patient Pathway Co-ordinator role going to benefit patients, given the criticisms in The Francis Report of inadequate patient engagement with staff.
      1. When will the TPE be implemented?
      2. What are the detailed plans to place hospital services into clinics?
      3. The buildings for sale have to be used for health purposes. Does the Board have any concerns about their purchase and use by health providers?
      4. Care in the Community is inefficient in that it takes up more, rather than less, staff time. How can the proposals for Care in the Community take place without an increased quota of nursing staff?
      5. In what ways does the Board consider that it has consulted with the Whittington Community?
      6. What opinions of the sell-off plans has the Board heard from the community, and which ones will they consider in current Foundation Trust plans?
      7. Who commissioned Dictate-IT to work in the Hospital?
      8. How does the use of Dictate-IT guarantee accuracy and safety in patient record-keeping?
      9. Why are senior managers leaving the Hospital? Does this reflect any changes in plans? This is of concern, given that one of them was responsible for the Unipart engagement in the sell-off plans.
      10. Why is the employment treatment of staff so very poor, and a culture of fear and intimidation by sections of management being allowed to develop? This has an impact on staff morale and in the trust of patients and staff in care management at the Hospital.
      11. Changes seem to be occurring without consultation or knowledge of the staff or patients. There is a serious lack of transparency and communication, creating fear, frustration and mistrust inside and outside the Hospital.  How are you going to address the lack of management transparency?