Updated statement issued on proposed shake-up of Lincolnshire's hospital admin services, expanding on previous points
An updated statement has been issued on controversials plans to shake up how hospital admin services are run in Lincolnshire, expanding on the points previously made.
In November, we reported on a transformation programme being put forward by the United Lincolnshire Teaching Hospitals Trust (ULTH) – the organisation responsible for Boston’s Pilgrim Hospital, Grantham and District Hospital and Lincoln County Hospital.
According to the Unite union, the proposals would impact almost 650 employees in a range of medical and non-medical roles and could put about 180 jobs at risk.
Separately, it was reported to the Standard that Boston does not feature in the model being put forward (the so-called ‘Patient Service Hub’). Instead, services would be based at Lincoln and Grantham in a ‘hub and spoke’ set up.
Earlier this month, we published a piece from the perspective of one of the affected workers.
For that article, we asked ULTH if it would like to add anything to its original statement (which can be found here).
Initially, it declined; however, the day after the article went live, it provided an updated statement.
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Caroline Landon, group chief operating officer at Lincolnshire Community and Hospitals NHS Group, said: “The intention of our Patient Services Hub transformation programme is to significantly improve how we coordinate patient care in our hospitals. This is in response to feedback from our patients about challenges they face in getting hold of people on the telephone to query, rearrange or cancel appointments and issues with letters they receive about their care. Our staff have also told us they are frustrated by the outdated technology currently used to manage patient appointments, as we rely on 15 different systems and 40 mailboxes to handle patient bookings.
“We are currently conducting a consultation with a number of patient administration colleagues across our Trust, with the intention of designing the future model for this service together to ensure that it meets the needs of our patients across Lincolnshire.
“We value our administrative and clerical staff, and fully acknowledge the important role that they play in patient care. This programme is about enabling and supporting these colleagues.
“The proposed Patient Service Hub would bring together and modernise outpatient and inpatient administrative services, including using digital tools to ensure that our communication with patients is improved and making our processes simpler. It is not intended to remove human interaction, but to enhance it by reducing administrative inefficiencies. While automation would support routine tasks, patients will always continue to have direct access to staff for complex, urgent, or sensitive matters or if they’re not confident using digital tools.
“At this stage, this remains a proposal so it would be inappropriate to comment further on the details until we have heard from staff and considered their feedback.”
A petition set up against the plans has attracted more than 4,000 signatures.