South Tyneside Hospital

(asked on 26th February 2018) - View Source

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will undertake a review of the decision made by Sunderland and South Tyneside clinical commissioning groups to downgrade South Tyneside District Hospital.


Answered by
Steve Barclay Portrait
Steve Barclay
Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
This question was answered on 6th March 2018

Decisions on configuration are best taken by the local National Health Service, who can best assess how to meet the needs of people in their area.

For any significant system reconfiguration, we expect all local parts of the system to be talking to the public and stakeholders regularly — it is vital that people can shape the future of their local services.

All significant service change is subject to a full public consultation and proposals must meet the government’s four reconfiguration tests. These are support from clinical commissioners, clarity on the clinical evidence base, robust patient and public engagement and support for patient choice. There is additional NHS England guidance (fifth test) which means that proposed service reconfigurations should be tested for their impact on overall bed numbers in the area.

Local authorities play a key role in ensuring the democratic accountability of local health services, through their statutory oversight and scrutiny committees. Should such a committee remain unsatisfied with the handling of a proposed service change, one of their options is to ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care to consider undertaking his own review.

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