Leeds Children’s Heart Surgery Unit

Nicholas Dakin Excerpts

Tuesday 30th October 2012 Westminster Hall

[Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab)]

Thank you, Mr Hollobone. That is very helpful, as your chairmanship always is. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship.

I welcome the Minister to her post, and I congratulate the hon. Member for Pudsey (Stuart Andrew) on securing this debate. His cross-party and cross-regional leadership on this matter has been a credit to him and the region, and it is a pleasure to have worked with him. I hope we have a satisfactory outcome. He has spelled out in clinical detail the key issues in this case: the need to get the right clinical outcomes; the discrepancies in the clinical information issued throughout the process; the number of operations necessary to secure a unit; and the difficulties in securing that number of operations if Leeds closes and other centres are expected to receive its patients, given that if there is patient choice, it is clear that patients from the area that I represent, Scunthorpe, will probably go south, rather than north, to access services.

The hon. Gentleman has reminded us of the largest petition that I can remember in the region, which some 600,000 people signed at fairs and civic events in my constituency and, presumably, across the whole region. That was an active process in which people were engaged and supportive. Counting that as one response is not giving the public view the weight that it should have.

The villages and towns of the area that I represent will always be peripheral and on the edge. People from our area must travel to access services. It is interesting to note their concerns. I will refer to a couple of correspondents, because theirs are the voices of which we need to be reminded, and their observations echo the points made by the hon. Member for Pudsey. One correspondent said:

“All of us heart families, as you can imagine, are devastated…Please can you review this decision and hear our views?”

Behind the petition signed by 600,000 people are many people’s views. Another correspondent said:

“Our daughter is diagnosed with a rare condition, truncus arteriosus. She had major open heart surgery in July 2011 at Leeds general infirmary. Naturally, we were devastated with the diagnosis, coming to terms with it and going through her operation and hospital stay. The service they provide at Leeds is…at its best. I feel that our daughter is in extremely safe hands there. The staff on ward 4, ward 10 and HDU provide the best quality of care. The cardiologists and surgeons are truly amazing in the work they do. Whilst our daughter was in hospital, this was a terrifying time for us. Leeds is a good hour’s drive away, which is bearable in this situation”,

but

“it could endanger lives if people have to travel further, for example those babies born who need emergency heart surgery. I have read so many comments on the support group page that if Leeds surgery closed and they had had to travel further afield, their baby would not have survived the journey.

All the facilities are on site at Leeds general infirmary, i.e. X-rays and other investigations that need to be done prior to operation. Again, if Leeds was closed and we had to go to Newcastle, my understanding is the checks have to be done at other hospitals, again endangering lives in those more serious cases.”

Another constituent of mine says:

“I would now like to explain how the threatened closure affects my daughter. I have a 5 year old daughter who has 22q deletion…She has a number of complex, life-affecting and life-threatening health conditions, including serious congenital heart defects, as well as learning and communication problems. She is a pupil at St Luke’s school in Scunthorpe. Routine antenatal appointments at Scunthorpe failed to pick up her problems; an additional late scan there found a problem, and antenatal care was then transferred to Leeds.

Leeds general infirmary provides many services under one roof. During her stay on the cardiac ward, I required treatment due to birth complications and had access to the midwifery team and appropriate treatment. I was unable to walk following the birth for several days, and was able to stay on the heart ward with food provided and then in family accommodation.”

That emphasises the proximity of all services, and how that affects the well-being of not only heart patients, but mothers and other family members.

I take note of your instructions and encouragement, Mr Hollobone. I feel that I have reinforced the issues that were raised in the excellent speech made by the hon. Member for Pudsey, and I have added a couple of illustrations from my constituency that underline the point.