Our views are not being heard, say nurses on controversial healthcare review

The Royal College of Nursing London has responded to concerns raised with it by its members about the Better Services Better Value (BSBV) review, which is looking to reconfigure services across Epsom, St Helier, Kingston, Croydon and St George’s Hospitals, and has proposed to axe the A&E, children and maternity wards at Epsom.

Bernell Bussue, the RCN’s London regional director, said: "There is still a feeling among nurses in the hospitals involved that their views on these plans are not being properly taken into account.

"The nursing staff at these hospitals are the ones who have daily contact with the patients who will be affected by these plans.

"Those staff understand better than anyone the real needs of the local community.

"If this process is to proceed as intended it is essential that there is proper clinical engagement with all those working on the front line in South West London."

In May, Mike Smith, chairman of the RCN’s Outer South West London Branch wrote an open letter to GPs condemning the proposals.

He said: "From BSBV’s inception we have asked to be represented.  However these requests have always been denied meaning that there has only been a token nurse or other non-medical clinician in the largely doctor-led work streams.

"Elected and representative bodies such as the RCN have been largely ignored.

"Now that the proposals have been published we see all sorts of problems for the local health economy caused in part, by failure to engage and listen to clinicians such as ourselves, who work on the frontline in our hospitals, in the community and in the private sector where healthcare is delivered to the local population."

A date for the crunch meeting, where all seven of the affected areas’ clinical commissioning groups and NHS England will meet to vote on whether the BSBV proposals should go to public consultation, has still not been set.