Bid to save West Norfolk service scores win
USERS of a threatened specialist nursing team have won a victory in their battle to save it, the Lynn News can reveal.
Health service providers will now have to convince an independent panel that proposals surrounding the West Norfolk mental illness and learning difficulties team are in the best interests of those involved.
The news comes as a result of unanimous support for full consultation on the proposals at a Norfolk health overview and scrutiny meeting on Thursday.
Care bosses were going to hurry through plans to amalgamate the team at Park View Resource Centre, in Lynn, with existing community support services, without formal consultation, but put them before the scrutiny committee after an outcry from users, as reported in the Lynn News last Tuesday.
Josette Simpson, who is supported by the team in the care of her 48-year-old daughter, said: "I feel we have got past the first hurdle."
Health bosses insist the changes would not lead to a lesser service, but Mrs Simpson (66), of Castle Acre Rose, Great Massingham, and many other users fear it will see nurses replaced with social workers.
Service providers are now likely to have 90 days to build their case and must consult fully with users before reporting back to the scrutiny committee.
The committee then has the right to either challenge the quality of the consultation or the decision with the Secretary of State for Health.
Management of the team has already transferred from health provider Norfolk Primary Care Trust to joint health and social care provider Norfolk Learning Difficulties Service, but no further changes are now allowed until the scrutiny committee is satisfied.
One of West Norfolk's representatives on the committee, Cllr Anthony Wright, fears the proposed changes, which will reportedly save 214,000 a year, come as a result of the shared debt inherited by West Norfolk when it lost its own solvent primary care trust and was forced to merge with the rest of the county.
He said: "I think the service should be reinstated as it was. From what I can see it was a good service, possibly better than in the rest of Norfolk, and what is happening since the amalgamation of the PCTs is they are trying to standardise everything and that is not always in the best interests of the local service."
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Saturday 26 May 2012
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