Overview and Scrutiny

Children's Heart Surgery Consultation

Review Details

This review is in progress

NHS Specialised Services have undertaken a ‘Safe and Sustainable’ review of Children’s Congenital Cardiac Services in England at a national level, and put proposals for change to a Joint Committee of PCT’s. The proposals are out to public consultation between 28 February and 1 July 2011. The consultation covers four aspects:

  • Development of congenital heart networks
  • Implementation of new clinical standards
  • New systems for analysis and reporting of mortality and morbidity data
  • Reduction in number of hospitals providing children’s heart surgery from 11 to 6 or 7

Children’s heart surgery is currently undertaken at Southampton General Hospital, however Southampton General Hospital is only in one of the four potential configurations being consulted upon. Therefore, the proposals could constitute a substantial variation in local services for the population of Hampshire (and the wider South Central region). This panel has been set up as a sub-committee of the Hampshire Health Overview and Scrutiny Committee to consider the suitability of the consultation process, and to scrutinise the proposals to inform the HOSC’s response to the public consultation.

The HOSC is not leading the consultation on this proposal but is a formal consultee.  Members of the public wishing to comment on this consultation should respond directly to the NHS Specialist Services Team. Further information about the consultation process, including a response form and details about a series of public meetings that are being held are available on the NHS Children's Congenital Cardiac Services website.

 

Documents

Documents can be requested in alternative versions (such as large print, braille or audio) or in alternative languages by phoning 01962 845751 or emailing members.services@hants.gov.uk

Response to the consultation

Following consideration of the issues the panel, on behalf of the Health Overview and Scrutiny Committee, submitted the following response to the consultation. The panel supports 'option B' which would allow Southampton General Hospital to continue providing paediatric cardiac surgery services:

Following submission of this response, the Safe & Sustainable national team leading the consultation, have responded to the recommendations the HOSC made as follows:

Southampton University Hospital's Trust have also responded to the consultation and their views are published on their website:

A summary of all the responses received nationally to this consultation is now available from the NHS Specialised Services website

Key Lines of Inquiry

The panel members have identified key lines of inquiry to explore the issues involved:

Based on the issues identified, a number of questions have been identified that the panel have put to the Specialised Commissioning Group:

Summary of the proposals

The proposals being consulted upon for the future configuration of children's heart services are detailed in the 234 page consultation document and a 148 page pre-consultation business case (available from the specialised services consultation webpages). This summary of the proposals and how they were arrived at has been prepared to assist the panel looking at this consultation.

Correspondence

The Chairman of this panel wrote to the NHS Specialised Commissioning team laying out initial concerns regarding the consultation process, for example concerns regarding the complexity of the consultation document and response form. These concerns were also highlighted in a letter to the local press. The NHS Specialised Commissioning team responded indicating that comments made by email or letter would also be taken into account

 

 

Related Meetings

Panel meeting - 26 May 2011