A and E Departments Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateDepartment: Department of Health and Social Care
Stephen Pound
Main Page: Stephen Pound (Labour - Ealing North)Department Debates - View all Stephen Pound's debates with the Department of Health and Social Care
(11 years, 7 months ago)
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Mr Hunt
My hon. Friend speaks extremely wisely. We must do just that, particularly for the frail elderly, people with long-term complex conditions, because they are the people for whom an A and E department can be a bewildering place, especially if it knows nothing about them and cannot access their medical records. Prevention is far better than cure, and I agree that that is one way of doing it.
Stephen Pound (Ealing North) (Lab)
The Secretary of State advises us to visit A and E departments. Were he to visit the one in the excellent Ealing hospital in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Ealing, Southall (Mr Sharma), he would see the grotesque, confusing and expensive sight of a spatchcocked urgent care centre next to an A and E department, one acting as a gateway for the other. It is confusing, divisive and expensive. Is he entirely comfortable with this concept?
Mr Hunt
The hon. Gentleman makes an important point. We have failed as an NHS to give the public confidence in there being anything between an A and E department and a GP surgery. Whether they are urgent care centres or other centres, the public do not have that confidence and do not understand their role. We need other things, besides those two extremes, and to do a better job of informing the public about how they work. That is part of the reason for reforming primary care.