Why revisit this Alex strategy?

"A major clinical service and financial review is already under way. We have pledged that the process will be open and transparent throughout."

He goes on to write: "We are making efforts to engage with the communities we serve so that they can help shape hospital services of the future."

As a member of the Redditch community, I would like to know how I am going to have the opportunity to discuss the proposals when they are finalised in order that I can help shape hospital services.

At the moment, I am left with many questions since the only information I have is what I read in the newspapers.

Some of us will remember the strategy in the late 1990s called Investing in Excellence. Despite widely reported protests from the Kidderminster community, their hospital was closed as a general hospital.

Also in this strategy, as I can remember, the A&E at the Alexandra Hospital would have closed, with a nurse-led minor injuries unit put in its place. In-patient maternity, gynaecology and paediatrics would also have been transferred to Worcester.

This strategy was reviewed because Worcester did not have sufficient capacity. Indeed, many hundreds of thousands of pounds were subsequently spent upgrading the A&E at the Alexandra Hospital.

Before I left the trust as Chaplain Team Leader on March 31, part of my role was listening to the concerns of staff. I was frequently told patients had been transferred to the Alexandra Hospital from Worcester because Worcester was full.

What has changed so that a previously rejected strategy is being proposed again? How has capacity increased?

Where is the financial deficit occurring? In senior managers' meetings details used to be given of each directorate's (both clinical and non-clinical) under or over spend, and whether at Worcester or Redditch. To have such figures would help us understand more deeply where difficulties lie and how they have occurred, how they have been addressed in the past and why this has failed.

Comments have been made about a future midwifery-led birth centre in Redditch. Not long ago, following unexpected baby deaths, a report was published in such a centre at Kidderminster. My understanding is that part of the reason this birth centre was closed for deliveries was that there was no emergency paediatric cover on site.

The proposals I have read in the newspapers deal only with clinical areas. What other options are available, including a review into senior and middle management structures?

These are just some of my questions.

I also hope senior managers, not only local, but also at strategic health authority and ministerial level, realise health is not just a medical procedure but also has to do with patients not being isolated many miles from home but having easy access to the support of their family, friends and community.

It is essential managers find ways to maintain and improve our local services using the "facilities that are the envy of many other parts of the country" both in Redditch as well as in Worcester.

The Rev BARRY JONES

Barlich Way

Lodge Park