Hundreds of people take part in consultation over £17.6million plans for Bassetlaw Hospital

A total of £17.6 million is being invested into the hospital in Worksop to develop a modern centre for urgent and emergency care, creating an ‘Emergency Village’.

The new village will allow the children’s assessment unit and children’s outpatient department next to the emergency department.

The current children’s ward at the hospital, which is a distance from the Emergency Department, was closed to overnight admissions between 7pm and 8am in 2017 due to safety reasons related to staffing.

This means that some children have to be transferred to Doncaster Royal Infirmary if they require an overnight stay.

The changes will enable the opportunity to secure a permanent overnight inpatient service for children at Bassetlaw Hospital.

Almost 1,000 people have taken part in a consultation into the plans, which launched in mid-December.

Health bosses at NHS Bassetlaw Clinical Commissioning Group and Doncaster and Bassetlaw Teaching Hospitals are urging resident across Bassetlaw to have their say.

Chair of Bassetlaw CCG, Dr Eric Kelly said: “This impressive investment at Bassetlaw Hospital is extremely positive.

"It provides us with an opportunity to look at how we deliver urgent and emergency services for the people of Bassetlaw in a way which meets the needs of our community now and for years to come.

"It also allows us to address the challenges which led to the temporary closure of the overnight children’s inpatient service in January 2017 due to safety issues.

"We understood the strength of feeling from local people when this change was initially introduced.

"We now want to ensure we consult widely with local people before we make any further changes.”

The consultation asks what people feel is important in the development of the Emergency Village and are given three options.

The first option is to continue with the current temporary operating model, the second is to create a dedicated children’s assessment unit that closes to overnight admissions and the third option is to create a dedicated CAU but maintain overnight admissions and short-term stays.

Chief Nurse at DBTH, David Purdue said “The response we have received from the public so far has been fantastic and has provided the hospital with invaluable insights to the needs of local people.

“From previous feedback we have found that patients and their families prefer to receive care closer home.

"We believe that by co-locating children’s services at the front door of the hospital we will be able to enhance our current service by providing short stay assessments any time – day or night.

"This will mean that for many more patients and their families they will be able to receive urgent care at Bassetlaw Hospital before being safely discharged home, without being transferred to DRI for an overnight stay.

"This model still requires us to retain our fantastic specialist children’s nurses and recruit newly qualified nurses, but we believe this is now a very realistic prospect given the investment in Bassetlaw and co-location enables us to make more efficient use of our dedicated staff.

“We remain committed to ensuring all our children are provided high quality, safe care in an appropriate environment where their needs can best be met, so please, use this opportunity to share your views.”

The survey remains open until 28 February 2022. People can take part here.