Heatherwood Hospital
January to June 1988

Little Bundles of Fun Born At Heatherwood

Photo Only Article
Extract Bracknell Times 07/01/1988

Comment:- The above article was a photo.
front, Karen Rackley with David, left, Karen Argrave with baby Shane and Bridgette Jones with daughter Katie
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Health Service Set For Revamp

Multi-million pound health plans have been outlined for Berkshire, which bosses hope will provide a better service for all.
The mid-term strategy for hospitals in East Berkshire means some dramatic changes will be on the way if members approve them at a meeting next week.
The proposals are part of a review of the ten-year strategic plan up to 1994. The most important plans include:
A community hospital at Bracknell for the elderly and mentally infirm:
A community role for Windsor's King Edward VII Hospital.
General medicine and general surgery facilities would be transferred to Ascot's Heatherwood and Slough's Wexham Park units:
Two hundred more beds for the elderly, taking the total to 424 by 1993/4:
A reduction in acute beds from 663 to 633 and an increase in day surgery beds from 22 to 46 by 1993/4 Health chiefs have been working on the plans for the past six months.
They want to provide a community hospital to all areas and concentrate all acute services at Heatherwood and Wexham Park.
Jeremy Cobb, director of planning and information, said: "There is a danger of acute services having too many elderly people in their beds.
Building work on Bracknell's new community hospital is due to begin from about 1993 and open two years later.
It will be built on the Church Hill House Hospital site and will include 25 beds for the elderly mentally ill and 75 beds for the elderly.
The King Edward VII will run the district's breast cancer screening service and will continue running its eye unit.
But calls to provide maternity, accident and emergency units were rejected.
The district plans to pay for the changes by tightening existing procedures, selling off land and closing down Ivor Cottage Hospital and Old Windsor.
Brian Mackness, director of support services, said there was no question of redundancies and the situation was being discussed with employees.
If members approve the 5 plans they will then be sent out for consultation.
Extract Evening Post 13/01/1988

 

Nurses in Strike Threat Over Pay

Nurses at Wokingham and Heatherwood Hospital may strike if the Government carries out its plan to scrap special duty payments and introduce an hourly rate.
Unless the Government acts fast, the 24 hour dispute by 37 night-shift nurses at a Manchester hospital could be repeated by angry nurses at the two hospitals.
The warning comes from NUPE's branch secretary Keith Hope, the union who called the overnight stoppage in Manchester the first ever strike in the nursing profession.
Nurses predict the Government proposals could mean a savage pay cut of up to £40 for senior staff.
Mr Hope said: "The nurses at Heatherwood and Wokingham are prepared to strike.
They are angry because the Government has dealing on the goodwill of the nurses and the goodwill has gone.
"Morale in the profession is low and staffing levels are down more than ever before.
In many cases just two nurses are looking after 20 patients."
Strike
He added: "Nurses in West Berkshire and East Berkshire health authorities look set to strike if the Government does not come to an arrangement with the Trades Union Congress later in the week.
"The last straw was in September when West Berks agreed to £1.3m cuts in the health service."
NUPE area organiser Alex Rennie, who represents 300 nurses, said strike action I had been on the cards for some time.
"If they take action it is going to destroy an image that has been created over years, but if they do not then the nursing service as know it will disappear."
Extract Wokingham Times 14/01/1988

 

Community Hospital Plan For Bracknell

Bracknell could have a new community hospital by the mid 1990s with Heatherwood Hospital, Ascot, upgraded to provide increased acute services.
The proposals were announced at a press conference on Monday called by the East Berkshire Health Authority.
Local health chiefs have taken a fresh look at the district's needs and plan to focus acute and maternity services at Heatherwood and Slough's Wexham Park.
Community hospitals, will cater for the future increased number of elderly in the area, freeing more general hospital beds for other patients.
By 1995 the authority hopes to have introduced 50 new beds for the elderly at Heatherwood and a new unit of 75 beds on the Church Hill Hospital site.
It is envisaged the Bracknell community hospital will have three 25-bed wards, one a GP ward, and later the authority would like to add a day care hospital.
The exact plan depends on developments in the Mental Handicap Strategy as care for the mentally-handicapped shifts more into the community with the emphasis on day centres like Bracknell's Waymead Centre
Dr Jeremy Cobb, Director of Planning for East Berks District Health Authority, said this strategy had the full support of parents and relations of patients at Church Hill House Hospital.
Throughout East Berks the health chiefs plan to raise the number of beds for the elderly from the present 261 to 424 in 1993/4.
The number of acute service beds across the district will drop from 663 to 633 in the same period, but the authority intends more than doubling the number of day treatment beds to 46.
Centralising acute services for the southern part of the district at Heatherwood means the number of acute beds will grow from 203 at present to 248 by the mid 1990's.
Unwanted
The authority has found money for the initial stages of its plan by selling off some of its unwanted sites at Old Windsor and Slough's Upton Hospitals.
Ward closures at Heatherwood Hospital have been avoided after Oxford Regional Health Authority allocated East Berkshire its full £382,000 share of the government handout to ease the immediate cash crisis.
An East Berkshire District Health Authority spokesman stressed the money would only last until the end of the financial year.
The situation will then have to be reassessed in the light of the authority's expected £1 million budget deficit.
Extract Bracknell Times 14/01/1988

 

Health Chiefs Plan Hospital Service Boost

East Berkshire health chiefs have given their backing to multi million pound changes aimed at improving the region's hospital services.
The proposals, part of review of a ten-year strategic plan for the region up to 1994, were approved for consultation by East Berkshire Health Authority yesterday.
They include a new community hospital at Bracknell for the elderly and mentally infirm, building work on which is due to start in 1993. It will be built on the Church Hill House Hospital site and will have 25 beds for the elderly mentally ill and 75 beds for the elderly.
Windsor's King Edward VII Hospital is to take on a community role, with its general medical and surgical facilities to be transferred to Ascot's Heatherwood and Slough's Wexham Park units.
Also planned for 1993/94 are another 200 beds for the elderly, a reduction in beds from 663 to 633 and an increase in day surgery beds from 22 to 46.
Health authority bosses have been working on the proposals for the past six months and will be looking at them again in June after consultation with local councils and the public.
Brian Mackness, East Berkshire's director of support services, said: "We see this refinement of the strategic plan as pointing the way ahead to the creation of the sort of health service that the overall population of East Berkshire will need in the mid-1990s, catering for, among others, the increasing number of elderly people."
The health authority has also agreed to buy a £400,000 scanner, providing the region with the latest X-ray technology to improve the detection of diseases.
Mr Mackness said that it would be a "most exciting development" for the region.
We will now have a scanner locally which will be of enormous benefit to the population of East Berkshire," he said.
He said that the scanner would be made available to private patients and other health authorities to make it self-financing
Extract Evening Post 21/01/1988

 

Stub Out the Cigs with Adoption Help

How would you like to adopt a smoker?
That is the question to be asked by East Berkshire Health Promotion Unit as it launches a new stop smoking campaign. The unit won a grant from the Health Education Authority to run an American style Quit And Win competition.
The idea is to get colleagues and families of smokers to support them in giving up and help by offering prizes.
People can also "adopt" a smoker to help them give up the habit.
The unit want to get companies in the area to donate prizes for the competition which starts on National No Smoking Day, March 9. Heatherwood Hospital in Ascot has started a no-smoking policy for all staff.
Staff are now forbidden to smoke where they can be seen to be public health employees, except in special signposted areas in the hospital.
Extract Bracknell & Wokingham Times 21/01/1988

 

Old Get Priority

Care for the elderly is top of the health agenda in the 1990's for East Berkshire but it could spell the end of Iver Cottage Hospital.
The health authority hopes to increase the number of beds for the elderly by 62 per cent within ten years.
It aims to provide better care so elderly people can return home in a fitter state to continue their lives.
But the plan would mean the closure and sale of Iver cottage hospital, whose patients would be accommodated in ward 8/9 at Upton Hospital, Slough, taking its total to 85.
Another plan is to concentrate acute services on two sites at Wexham Park Hospital and Heatherwood in Ascot. The plan overwhelmingly accepted by members of the district health meeting will be sent to local bodies for comment before a draft is drawn up in June.
Chairman Dr Donald Mcwilliams said the paper was a strategic plan, not a tactical one.
Extract Buckinghamshire Advertiser 27/01/1988

 

Doctors Cash Drive

Wexham Park Hospital doctors are to launch an appeal to help fund a new on-site training centre.
At a meeting last week, East Berkshire Health Authority approved the plan.
The new post-graduate centre will house a library, seminar rooms, accommodation and other facilities and provide training for junior members of staff.
The authority also agreed to upgrade training facilities at Heatherwood Hospital, Ascot.
District authority member Dr Roger Scott said the new facilities were essential for attracting good medical staff.
Details of the appeal have not yet been worked out.
Extract Buckinghamshire Advertiser 27/01/1988

 

Bid To Attract Health Staff

Improvements in training facilities at Ascot's Heatherwood Hospital could help ease East Berkshire's medical staff crisis.
Health chiefs are hoping upgraded training facilities will help attract more junior doctors and nurses to the area.
The authority is also urging Oxford Regional Health Authority to ease advertising restrictions in its search for vital staff.
The authority is drawing up plans to add library facilities, seminar rooms,and support services to both Heatherwood and Slough's Wexham Park Hospitals.
A large 200-seat lecture theatre and exhibition room could be added to one of the hospitals.
To meet these requirements the authority wants to adapt the ground floor of Heatherwood House to train medical nursing and other staff. Further expansion is a future possibility.
"For attracting staff to East Berkshire these training facilities are very important. When applying for jobs postgraduate medical staff look for training facilities," said Brian Mackness, Director of Support Services for East Berkshire.
"Most doctors study in their spare time in the evening. They do not want to get in a car to find a library. A lot of postgraduate staff study during coffee and lunch breaks and need facilities close at hand."
Moving and upgrading training facilities from its present site in Windsor's King Edward VII Hospital reflects East Berks Health Authority's recent decision to focus acute and maternity services at Heatherwood and Wexham Park Hospitals.
Heatherwood Hospital's general manager John Neate said: "New training facilities are very important for us particularly if we are going to develop Heatherwood Hospital."
Making Heatherwood a training centre would help not only postgraduate staff but give further training to already qualified nurses. Mr Neate added: "In the longer term, we plan to be on the nurse training circuit for student nurses."
East Berks Health Authority have also asked Oxford: Regional Health Authority to relax nationwide restrictions on advertising staff vacancies.
"They are a problem. For example, we cannot stress the social advantages and amenities of this area, like being close to London," explained Mr Neate.
The restrictions try to: stop inappropriate competition between authorities of ever more lavish advertising. It is sound thinking, but over restrictive."
Extract Bracknell Times 28/01/1988

 

Workers Gift to Poorly Children

Bracknell workers brought a breath of fresh air to the children's ward of Ascot's Heatherwood Hospital. Representatives of British Aerospace's Heatherwood Hospital Committee presented the children's ward with a Medap Ultrasonic Nebuliser which helps children with breathing problems like pneumonia and croup.
Three times a year more than 2,000 BAe employees dig into their pockets to add to a whip-round organised for the hospital by the Amalgamated Engineering Union.
This year they went for their most ambitious target yet, the £1,254 cost of the machine, and achieved it in just six months. "We have provided two beds previously, but that was getting a bit boring so we wanted to do something special for the children's ward," said shop steward Peter Clemence.
Ward sister Lorna Wright explained: "The machines are very valuable at this time of year when we get a lot of chesty children. There are six children with pneumonia in the ward at the moment."
Extract Evening Post 28/01/1988

Comment:- The above article was accompanied by a photo.
The caption presentation smiles from the back,Nurse Jane Burrows,baby Damien Chandler, June Higginson, and front Peter Clemence and Eric Thompson
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On Cue For a World Record

Four Bracknell snooker players are on cue to create a new world record for the longest match ever all two weeks or more of it!
For at least 14 days and nights balls will shoot across the green baize of Bracknell's Regency Snooker Club to raise money for a vital new ultrasound department at Ascot's Heatherwood Hospital.
The target is £12,000 minimum, with extra money going to children in Need, and already companies are pouring in support for this enormous feat of stamina.
At midday on Feb 1, mechanic Dave Parrott and salesman Gordon Marshall, both from Bracknell, will take on club staff Peter Rentell from Crowthorne and Jimmy Toomey from Bracknell in the marathon match expected to go to over 700 frames.
The players are allowed five minutes break at the end of every hour's play and will go on a special booze-free diet the week before to get them through the fortnight.
The players were highly confident of staying the course and a friendly rivalry has already set in.
"Basically we aim to thrash the other two," said Mr Toomey.
Mr Marshall retorted: "That lot aren't going to win a frame in two weeks if we can help it."
East Berks MP Andrew MacKay and Chief Inspector of Bracknell Police Ron Angell will act as official adjudicators at the start of the bid for a place in the Guinness Book of Records.
Bracknell's Barclays Bank have donated bedding and other equipment for what little rest the players can get and on Thursday
Bracknell based Ethyl Petroleum Additives pledged a £1 for every hour played.
Anyone else wanting to support the marathon match can phone Regency Snooker Club manager Dick Pitchford on Bracknell 424854.
Extract Bracknell & Wokingham Times 28/01/1988

Comment:- The above article was accompanied by a photo.
The caption referee Lee Cameron meets players Peter Rentell,Jim Toomey,Dave Parrott and Gordon Marshall
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Warning On Nurses Action

A decision by nurses at a Berkshire hospital in favour of industrial action could herald a wave of protests across the county, a union chief has warned.
Nurses at Heatherwood Hospital, Ascot, yesterday voted to take action and will be balloted early next week to decide exactly what to do.
It comes as colleagues across the country. including nurses at three Oxfordshire hospitals, prepare for tomorrow's day of action in protest at underfunding of the health service, low pay and staff shortages.
Fifty per cent of the Heatherwood hospital's 200 nurses are members of MATSA, the nursing section of Britain's second biggest union, the GMB.
GMB's Thames Valley organiser lan Keys said: "I am confident that they will be taking action after the ballot. It could be just a work to rule. It is only likely to last a day."
Mr Keys said that nurses' frustration had finally boiled over and that further action was likely in Berkshire following the stand being made by Heatherwood staff.
Members of the three major nurses' unions, MATSA, Cohse and Nupe will be meeting tomorrow to consider action at Slough's Wexham Park Hospital.
Nursing staff at Borocourt Hospital for the mentally handicapped yesterday voted against taking part in any protest.
Delegation
The Royal College of Nursing has urged its members to defy the national day of action. It is advising its members to cross picket lines and any members who do strike will be disciplined.
A TUC delegation led by General Secretary Norman Willis arrived at DHSS headquarters in London today for talks with Health Secretary John Moore.
The delegation will repeat the TUC's demand for an extra £750 million for the NHS on top of this year's nurses' pay award.
Nurses and other health workers formed picket lines at every entrance to the Maudesley Hospital in south east London after they walked off the wards today.
A £200,000 cash injection into West Berkshire's cash-starved health service will not save threatened maternity units.
The warning comes from authority chairman Dr Peter Phillips, after news that the regional health authority is set to approve the money for West Berkshire.
Action groups claim the handout could save the three peripheral maternity units officers want to scrap, but Dr Phillips today said this would not be feasible.
Extract Evening Post 02/02/1988

 

MP First to Chalk Up The Score For Charity

There is one Berkshire MP who is more interested in pool than polling.
Andrew MacKay, MP for East Berkshire, chalked up with the best of them yesterday at a charity snooker marathon in Bracknell's Regency Snooker Club. Mr Mackay made the first break in the marathon pool game which four Berkshire sportsmen hope will be their cue into the Guinness Book of Records.
After cueing up at midday, Peter Rentall, Jim Toomey, Dave Parrot and Gordon Marshall plan to play for 24 hours a day for two weeks.
And each hour of play will raise money for a much needed ultra sound unit for Heatherwood Hospital.
The hospital need £12,000 for the unit and if that total is topped, the balance will go to Children In Need.
Extract Evening Post 02/02/1988

Comment:- The above article was accompanied by a photo.
The caption MP Andrew McKay at the centre of the big break, with him from the left Jim Toomey Peter Rentell,Dave Parrott and Gordon Marshall
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High Tech Health Care

Cramped working conditions and a draughty waiting room in Heatherwood Hospital's high tech ultrasound department will soon be a thing of the past.
The Ascot hospital has launched a £30,000 scheme to rehouse its state-of-the-art scanning equipment in a modern, more comfortable building. Some £12,000 will be raised from a sponsored 14 day non-stop snooker tournament at Bracknell's Regency Snooker Club on Feb 1.
Ultrasound equipment, using high frequency sound waves to create a picture on screen, has revolutionised the internal examination of patients.
Heatherwood Hospital possesses two machines which can even spot a cleft pallet in an unborn child and gall stones just two millimetres in size.
The harmless sound waves are mainly used for scanning pregnant mothers at 18 weeks to check the baby is developing normally.
Ultrasound techniques can also be used to investigate kidney disorders, find gallstones and diagnose fertility problems.
Such equipment has rendered the former hand and stethoscope probing techniques ancient history. "Previously doctors examined by feeling and listening to the baby's heart beat. It was as crude as that," said Dr Carole Luck, eight years a consultant radiologist at Heatherwood.
Valuable
Being able to spot internal problems at an early stage means patients can often escape the trauma of investigative surgery.
In other cases abscesses of pus can be drained and tumours attacked using needles which are directed by the pin-point accuracy shown on the ultrasound screen.
Full-blown surgery can thus be avoided, freeing valuable time in operating theatres for other patients.
Around 35 people are examined by the unit each day, most from Bracknell and Ascot.
But the recent arrival of ultrasound machines in hospitals has meant them being squeezed into existing buildings, often leaving the staff little room to work and patient facilities uncomfortable.
Dr Luck describes Heatherwood's six-year-old ultrasound unit as 'ghastly', The small waiting-room is e cold and draughty as each opened outside door heralds a blast of wind on blustery days.
At least two people work in an office reception the size of a large store cupboard and waiting people can overhear almost everything.
Patient privacy in the first examination room is only managed by hiding the couch behind a screen and pregnant women who need full bladders for scanning have to walk through to get to the toilet.
"It is like Piccadilly Circus. When you think of what's done here, it is crazy," said Dr Luck. A tiny second examination room next door gives staff little room for movement.
Card records are kept there in an alcove and, as ultrasound equipment has to be used in almost complete darkness, sorting through them is at times impossible.
Comfort
The lack of a proper sink with mixed hot and cold running water means the consultants have to clean up in a room 20 yards down a corridor before examining a patient.
"The extension and improvements will mean more comfort for the patients and better working conditions for staff," said Dr Luck.
The refurbished unit will increase floorspace by a third giving spacious examination rooms, a warm and carpeted waiting room, improved back-up facilities and a terminal accessing new computerised patients' records system.
Extract Wokingham Times 04/02/1988

Comment:- The above article was accompanied by a photo.
The caption Dr Carole Luck with a patient at Heatherwood Hospital
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Nurses in Strike Threat

Nurses at Bracknell and Ascot met this week to vote on taking strike action. The results are expected to be announced early next week.
Nurses at Heatherwood Hospital, Ascot, faced a union recommendation for at least one day of action when they met on Tuesday.
Nurses at Church Hill House Hospital, Bracknell were set to meet yesterday.
It is still not certain how many nurses at Heatherwood Hospital would join any action, as at least three unions are represented there.
Calls for strike action are prompted by claims that nurses are being put under increasing pressure from mounting problems.
But Terry Philbey, COHSE secretary at Church Hill House, insists a minimum standard of health care will be provided if the day of action goes ahead.
He said: "The last thing we want to do is hurt the patients we care for but we've got to show how strongly we feel about our pay and conditions."
John McDougal, who represents nurses in MATSA, the professional section of the General, Municipal and Boilermakers Union, said emergency cover would be maintained.
Mr Philbey claims in one department of Church Hill House, 29 staff had left in the past two years because of low pay.
Nursing assistants at the hospital, who feed, bath and change patients were earning a little over £4,000 a year, he said.
The day of action plans include picket line protests, lobbying of health chiefs and encouraging the public to sign a petition calling for more health spending.
Extract Bracknell & Wokingham Times 11/02/1988

 

Special gift for hospital

Young Sunninghill pupils cooked up a special gift for Ascot's Heatherwood Hospital children's ward. The youngsters of Coworth Park School, London Road, held a huge cake sale and collected £183 from the proceeds.
Mums also decided to show off their cookery skills and turned out an enormous array of beautifully decorated gateaux to go alongside the children's cakes.
Sweet-toothed parents and youngsters quickly snapped up the goodies one December afternoon after school to raise the big donation to the hospital.
Extract Bracknell Times 11/02/1988

Comment:- The above article was accompanied by a photo.
The caption The children are pictured (above) handing over the cheque to staff nurse Jeanette Murray.
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Snooker

Four Berkshire lads are 'sticking' fatigue in the longest snooker match of all time, to raise £12,000 for Ascot's Heatherwood Hospital maternity unit.
Gordon Marshall, Jimmy Toomey and Dave Parrott, of Bracknell, and Peter Rentell, of Crowthorne, playing at Bracknell's Regency snooker club, plan to pot the black' on Monday 14 days straight a Guinness Book of Records record breaker!
Extract Evening Post 13/02/1988

 

Snooker Quartet Chalk Up Record for Charity

A two-week non-stop snooker marathon has raised cash for a Thames Valley hospital and a place in the Guinness Book of Records.
And it's all thanks to the staying power of four mates from the Regency Snooker Club, Bracknell. Gordon Marshall, Jimmy Toomey and Dave Parrott, of Bracknell, and Peter Rentell, of Crowthorne, played 22 hours a day since February 1.
Rules
It was the world's longest non-stop snooker match and raised £3,000 for an extension to the ultrasound scanner unit for pregnant women at Ascot's Heatherwood Hospital.
The snooker club hopes to boost funds for the unit to about £12,000 with additional events over the next six months.
The money will be given to hospital chiefs at a charity gala later this year.
Guinness Book of Record officials were at the club throughout the 14-day marathon, checking that record rules were strictly obeyed.
Manager of the Market Street snooker club, Dick Pitchford, said: "I think it was a great success from all aspects."It was marvellous and credit must go to all the people who have helped out.
Bash
All those involved in the snooker match are now planning a get together at the Bracknell club on Saturday for a celebration bash.
The record should appear in 1989 edition of the Guinness Book of Records.
Extract Evening Post 16/02/1988

Comment:- The above article was accompanied by a photo.
The caption Snooker Players With Staying Power, left to right Gordon Marshall,Dave Parrott, Peter Rentell and Jimmy Toomey.
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Nurses Threaten Action

Nurses in Bracknell and Ascot have moved one step closer to taking industrial action.
The outcome of a secret ballot is awaited at Bracknell's Church Hill House Hospital. And nurses from Heatherwood Hospital, Ascot, were set to lobby East Berkshire Health Authority in Slough yesterday.
COSHE branch secretary at Church Hill House, Terry Philbey, said: "On a show of hands the branch decided to take some form of industrial action.
The result of the ballot will be known next week." If action is decided, some nurses at Church Hill House will withdraw their labour for a whole day, Mr Philbey said. Others will strike for half a day and stage public protests, leafleting and petitions.
Vane Veerasingham. branch secretary for the GMB in East Berkshire, said nurses at Heatherwood Hospital have already met and called for some action to be taken.
Mrs Veerasingham said the health authority lobby, due to take place at Slough's Wexham Park Hospital, is not industrial action in itself. Nurses would be using their day off and their lunch breaks to protest, she said. Nurses from COSHE, NUPE and the GMB at Heatherwood Hospital and other hospitals in East Berkshire were set to join the protest.
Last week the Times inaccurately reported that union officials at Heatherwood Hospital had recommended members to take industrial action. No recommendation was made and the meeting was simply for discussion.
Extract Bracknell Times 18/02/1988

 

Nurses Await Hospital Strike Ballot Result

Nurses in two Berkshire towns have moved one step closer to taking industrial action. The result of a secret ballot due next week will determine action at Bracknell's Church Hill House Hospital.
And nurses from Ascot's Heatherwood Hospital have already lobbied East Berks Health Authority for a better deal for the health service.
The COSHE branch secretary at Church Hill House, Terry Philbey, said: "On a show of hands the branch decided to take some form of industrial action. The result of the ballot will be known next week."
He said industrial action might include a one day strike by some Church Hill nurses, while others might strike for half a day.
Vane Veerasingham, branch secretary of the General and Municipal Boilermakers Union in East Berkshire, said Heatherwood nurses had already demanded industrial action.
Nurses from COSHE, NUPE and the GMB at Heatherwood Hospital and other hospitals in East Berkshire were set to join the protest.
Extract Evening Post 18/02/1988

 

East Berkshire Community Health Council

Tuesday 1st March 2.00pm Recreation hall Heatherwood Hospital Ascot
Public Questions/ comment at start
Enquiries:Slough 20357
Extract Buckinghamshire Advertiser 24/02/1988

 

Nurses Plan Day of Action

Nurses at Bracknell's Church Hill House Hospital have voted to take industrial action on March 14. More than 200 nurses took part in the ballot on Monday which could lead to a 24 hour strike.
No definite decisions on the action to be taken have been made yet but COHSE union representative Terry Philbey stressed any action would not affect patients.
The Bracknell nurses are among hundreds throughout East Berkshire, including Heatherwood Hospital, Ascot, being balloted. COHSE also hopes to get support from other health unions.
March 14 has been singled out as a day of protest because it is on the eve of the Budget.
The union wants to persuade the government to put spend money put aside for a two pence tax cut on the NHS.
Bracknell nurses also plan to use the day to protest about East Berkshire's proposed implementation of its mental handicap strategy of moving patients out into the community.
Extract Bracknell Times 25/02/1988

 

High Tech Firms Birthday Gift

A top Bracknell's company is marking its 10th anniversary in the town this week with a series of gifts to worthy causes.
Multi-national company 3M, ranked 39th largest in the world, is treating children at Ascot's Heatherwood Hospital and Reading's Royal Berkshire Hospital with slices of birthday cake.
The company is also donating £100 to Heatherwood's accident unit and £100 to the West Berkshire Cancer Care Appeal.
Meals-on-Wheels in Bracknell will get 100 rum baba's and another birthday cake will go to the pensioners of Bracknell's Johnson Court Day Centre in Portman Close, Priestwood.
The company is also chipping in for a rose garden for the town's mentally handicapped.
Whopping
3M, whose roots trace back to the Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Company founded in 1902, made Bracknell its base for 3M United Kingdom Plc with a whopping £383 million turnover last year.
"Broadly speaking, 3M groups its business into four areas: information and imaging technologies, commercial and consumer products, life sciences, and industrial and electronic technologies," explained a spokesman.
Its huge range of products includes "Scotch" adhesive and recording tapes, reflective materials, laser imagers and other high-tech goods.
The company has also thrown its backing behind sponsoring and raising money for Britain's 1988 Olympic Games team for Seoul.
Extract Bracknell & Wokingham Times 25/02/1988

 

Workers Vote for Action

Health workers at Bracknell's Church Hill House hospital have voted to take industrial action on March 14.
COHSE union representative, Terry Philbey announced that other health service unions have agreed to support the action after a special meeting held last Tuesday.
Nurses at Heatherwood Hospital, Ascot are taking part in a protest march around London on March 5th, says union representative John McDougal. He represents nurses in MATSA, the professional section of the General, Municipal and Boilermakers Union.
The results of a secret ballot of nurses at Broadmoor hospital last week are still not known.
Mr George Elliot, Chairman of the Central Committee for the Prison Officers Association which represents Broadmoor said: "The central committee is supporting the nurse's case up to this point."
Extract Bracknell & Wokingham Times 03/03/1988

 

Friendly Care At £4.5M

by Mark Palin
The new £4.5 million mental health unit at Ascot's Heatherwood Hospital is now open for business. The development includes 50 beds for the mentally ill, 25 beds for the elderly mentally ill and a 40-place day hospital. Out-patient after-care facilities are also provided.
From April 1, all mentally ill people from Bracknell and the southern area of the East Berkshire health authority will go to the new unit.
Up until now most of Bracknell district's mentally ill were treated at St Bernard's Hospital in Ealing, London.
Health chiefs say the new unit, furnished to ultra-modern standards, will give more locally based care.
Colin Reeve, senior nurse manager for psychiatry at the unit said: "Family and friends of the people we treat here will be able to have an input.
They will be welcome to visit." The unit will provide a six-week assessment for all mentally ill people referred by their family doctor, social services or other organisations.
Staff at the unit will then decide at the end of six weeks where the person is best cared for. This could be in a social services hostel, a home for the elderly or at their own home. Once the person leaves Heatherwood there is an after-care system where psychiatric nurses visit the home to ensure treatment is given.
Health chiefs admit there is a shortage of special homes where the mentally ill can be placed.
There has been major problems recruiting staff to the unit although Heatherwood's unit general manager John Neate predicts most of the posts will be filled. Glossy brochures were printed and a £25,000 recruitment budget was set up to entice staff to come and work at the new unit.
A trip to Southern Ireland was mounted to recruit staff and results are said to have been promising.
The unit needs four doctors, 81 nurses, 13 paramedical and technical staff and seven clerical staff to function properly.
Health bosses also plan to stage an exhibition in Bracknell town centre soon to recruit domestic staff and cleaners to work at the Heatherwood unit.
While at the unit, people will be able to learn skills such as craft and pottery and gardening. Treatment will also include reality orientation and day trips out of the hospital.
The elderly mentally ill will also be able to learn new skills as part of their treatment in the day hospital.
Extract Bracknell & Wokingham Times 10/03/1988

Comment:- The above article was accompanied by a photo.
The caption empty chairs wait for placement on wards,also showed a member of the kitchen staff wheeling a trolley.
Copyright prevents us from displaying the photo here.

 

Art exhibition

A patient at Ascot's Heatherwood Hospital Day Unit for the mentally ill is holding an exhibition of her paintings at the unit for the next two weeks.
Jean D'ousinelle, from Windsor, has been painting since early childhood and will exhibiting 25 of her paintings.
Extract Bracknell & Wokingham Times 17/03/1988

 

Lakeside Cabaret Club

March 23
A charity evening in aid of the baby care unit of Heatherwood hospital starring the Tremeloes Marmalade Iris Williams Mia Carla & guests
Extract Surrey-Hants Star Evening Post 19/03/1988

 

Hospital Face £1M Cutbacks

Beds are to be reorganised at Heatherwood Hospital, Ascot, following cutbacks of nearly £1 million by East Berkshire health chiefs.
The cuts were approved by the health authority last Wednesday in a bid to beat a looming cash crisis.
The drastic-measures, which mean hospital beds will be lost in two acute units, will start from April.
East Berkshire Health Authority ordered the £852,600 cost cutting package which it reluctantly approved last October after reviewing its financial position.
Director of Support Services, Brian Mackness, said the cuts were aimed at producing a balanced budget, which the authority is required by law to do.
But he stressed members had only given their approval on the grounds that though beds would be reduced, the overall number of patients would not fall.
The cuts involve: The loss of 26 general medical beds at Windsor's King Edward VII Hospital plus bed reorganisation at Ascot's Heatherwood Hospital.
Cutting patient services at Slough's Wexham Park Hospital.
Extract Bracknell & Wokingham Times 24/03/1988

 

Making Light of Weighing

For the Bracknell branch of the National Childbirth Trust (NCT) have bought her a set of special baby scales.
Catriona Moore, NCT press officer, said: "Margaret needs the scales for her work and as they are not provided by the NHS we bought them for her.
"Each year the NCT uses money it raises from jumble sales and fundraising to buy things for people who need them."
The scales, costing £120, come in a handy easy to carry briefcase so Margaret can take them with her on visits to mums in the town.
They were presented at a special luncheon of Bracknell's NCT branch at Great Hollands Health Centre.
Mrs Moore said the NCT would be raising money for other projects, including providing a new children's slide at Ascot's Heatherwood Hospital.
Extract Bracknell Times 31/01/1988

Comment:- The above article was accompanied by a photo.
The caption Weighing In little Dominic Hayward gets the scale treatment from Margaret Deacock and Angelica Hayward
Copyright prevents us from displaying the photo here.

 

Hospital Stages Art Show

The walls of Ascot's Heatherwood Day Unit for the mentally ill were decorated with the work of a talented artist.
For Jean D'Ousinelle, a client at the unit, held an exhibition of her pictures that she has been painting since childhood.
The pictures, many worth several hundred pounds, featured a whole range of subjects from landscapes to people she has known.
Jean, 56, of Centre Road, Maidenhead, said: "I paint how I feel at the time. I don't plan it, I just put the paint on the canvass and watch it grow."
Gill Hall, a member of staff at the unit, said: "The paintings have created a lot of interest and certainly brightened up the corridors."
For further details and a brochure of Jean's pictures, call Heatherwood Day Unit on Ascot 21336.
Extract Bracknell Times 31/03/1988

Comment:- The above article was accompanied by a photo.
The caption Jean D'Ousinelle with one of her distinctive paintings.
Copyright prevents us from displaying the photo here.

 

Glum photo

Letter's Page
I wonder what your photographer saw in a row of eight sanitary chairs, a hospital bed and a member of the catering department pushing a trolley, to complement his article on the mental health unit at Heatherwood Hospital in the TIMES of March 10.
I am sure he could have chosen 101 scenes which might have lifted the hearts of future patients and their relatives, but this picture was dreary, depressing and uninformative.
A retired Nurse, Wokingham. (name and address supplied).
Extract Bracknell & Wokingham Times 07/04/1988

 

Special Baby unit Treats It's Charges With Loving Care

by Mark Palin
The nurses at the Special Care Baby Unit at Ascot's Heatherwood Hospital don't make a lot of noise about the work they do.
In fact, the patients being treated in the brightly decorated unit don't make much noise either. Not a single baby was crying when I was there.
Most of the babies in the unit simply don't have the strength to cry.
The unit can take up to 14 babies from the Bracknell and Ascot area who need very special and professional care.
Most of the babies treated there have either been born prematurely or were born after the full term and have special problems.
Babies can be incubated for just one day or for several weeks.
This allows staff to keep the baby under observation and prevents them catching infections.
There is one intensive care cot at the unit and, if a baby needs it, anything up to four staff may have to give the baby constant attention.
If the intensive care cot is in use the unit has to cut the number of admissions to the other cots because they simply don't have the staff to cover.
Junior ward sister Yvonne Wood is very modest about the traumas the staff at the unit have to cope with.
Problems
She said: "We don't know what is going to come through our doors on any day and we have to be ready for it.
"We do need more staff. If one person goes sick we have problems. There's no leeway." Former employees of the unit are contacted if staff are needed. If these bank staff are not available, expensive fees are paid to agencies to supply staff.
The unit is not full very often, Yvonne said, but if the unit cannot take a new admission, staff have to pick up the telephone and ring around other hospitals in the area to find a cot.
The recent case of a Reading woman having to travel over 70 miles to get treatment for her baby is very unusual, Yvonne told me.
A family from Bracknell and a woman from Finchampstead have launched a campaign to raise £10,000 for the unit.
Headaches
Nurses at the unit say they are very grateful for the help and cash that will come from that campaign.
Some new incubators, costing £7,000 a piece, were recently delivered to the unit, but it is the lack of staff that causes most headaches.
Although there is a core of staff, young single girls find they simply cannot make ends meet and usually leave.
Down the corridor is the delivery room where mothers give birth to their babies. If there are any problems the new born baby can immediately be rushed to the unit for on the spot care.
Local firms contribute generously to the unit and cheques are often presented by clubs and groups.
Yvonne admitted that the staff do get very attached to their patients but added: "It's nice to see them go home. "Parents bring them back in to show us how they are growing."
Extract Bracknell & Wokingham Times 07/04/1988

 

Community Steps Up Her Hunt For More Volunteers

Rosemary is a champion when it comes to befriending the needy
by Gillian Smith
Community worker Rosemary Webb has a bold message for Crowthorne residents:
"There's no need to be without a job in this village."
And to back up her statement the energetic mother of two would point at the huge number of community projects running in the area.
Rosemary spends countless hours each week helping to run many of Crowthorne's good neighbour's schemes, as well as looking after a home and family and holding down a job as a nurse at Ascot's Heatherwood Hospital.
And she now hopes to spur others into helping out with established schemes or setting up new ones.
She said: "There are plenty of ways to help and volunteers are always needed and welcomed. "And we never forget those who help." In the 17 years she has devoted to community service she has been one of the organisers of Crowthorne's mini-bus project.
Extract Wokingham Times 14/04/1988

 

Nurses Crisis Axes 100 Beds

by Carolyn Stobbart
A nursing crisis is hitting East Berkshire, despite moves by health bosses to increase staff levels. It has been disclosed that nursing shortages caused more than 100 beds to close at hospitals across the district earlier this year.
A meeting of the East Berkshire Health Authority heard yesterday the number of vacancies for trained staff had risen sharply in many specialities over the past year.
The health authority's director of support services. Brian Mackness. said this was despite initiatives such as redeploying staff. and recruitment drives.
Heatherwood Hospital in Ascot and Windsor's King Edward Hospital are crying out for staff in acute services and in psychiatry.
During February at Heatherwood Hospital, a total of 20 paediatric. medical and orthopaedic beds were shut because there were insufficient nurses to staff them.
At King Edward Hospital. 12 surgical beds were lost.
Mr Mackness blamed the staff shortages on the high cost of living in the district.
He said it was hoped the Government would announce a Thames Valley weighting allowance in its review of nurses' pay.
He said: "We have been campaigning for a long time for some sort of special recognition for this area, which we believe would help our recruitment problems."
On a more optimistic note. yesterday's meeting heard that though recruitment remained difficult, the number of nurses and midwives leaving the district had fallen slightly.
Extract Evening Post 21/04/1988

 

Angels Crisis Hits Wards

By Times Reporter
More than 100 hospital beds have been forced to close as East Berkshire hospitals face up to a nursing crisis. Poor pay and rocketing house prices are forcing nurses to leave in droves.
And hopes this week's national pay award would slow down the exodus have been dashed, with health unions and nurses claiming: "It's too little too late."
Bed closures have hit hospitals across the district. East Berkshire Health Authority members were told.
Recruitment was being hampered by the cost of living with the average price of a three bed semi in Bracknell standing at £85,000.
Brian Mackness, director of support services, told last Wednesday's meeting the crisis was in spite of initiatives to improve staff rolls, such as redeploying staff and recruitment drives.
At Heatherwood Hospital in Ascot and Windsor's King Edward Hospital they are crying out for staff in acute services and in psychiatry.
During February at Heatherwood Hospital a total of 20 paediatric, medical and orthopaedic beds were shut because they were not enough nurses to staff them, while at Windsor's King Edward hospital 12 surgical beds were lost.
Mr Mackness said members were hoping to see the Government announce a Thames Valley weighting allowance in this month's pay review.
The reaction of union leaders in Bracknell and Ascot to the new pay award was predictably cool. Terry Philbey, from COHSE, said: "Whether it will ease staff shortages or not, I doubt it."
General and Municipal Boilermakers Union official John McDougal, who represents nurses at Ascot's Heatherwood Hospital, said: "There are strings attached to it, including a review of nursing grades." The award, which will be funded totally by central government, ranges from between four and 15 per cent.
Many nurses fear that the regrading of all nursing jobs will make less qualified nurses leave the health service.
Their chief concern is that most of the promised pay increase will not come about until November after all nurses jobs have been regraded.
Betty Reilly, a sister at Church Hill House Hospital said: "I have been working here for 16 years and the regrading could lead to people who have been work here for a shorter time with more qualifications getting a bigger rise than me."
Joy Baker, an enrolled nurse at Ascot's Heatherwood Hospital said: "Once the posts have been regraded it will help those who have extra qualifications and done courses. "But there is a shortages of places on those courses so nurses who want to get more qualifications may have to wait a long time."
Mary Manns, director of nursing services at Heatherwood said there were about 25 nursing vacancies in the medical and surgical units under her.
Extract Bracknell Times 28/04/1988

 

Bracknell TWG

The April meeting was well attended. The minutes were read by Marion Parry and Eileen Rowley announced that Eunice Hanson should receive a gift of a pen for having competed on the Berkshire Federation Quiz Team.
The cake stall held at the March meeting had raised £47.50 for charity; the jumble sale had raised £81.26 jointly for guild funds and charity.
Members who had helped were thanked by the chairman.
On May 21 members have the charity stall at Bracknell market and once again are raising money for Heatherwood Hospital.

Extract Wokingham Times 28/04/1988

 

£16M Boost For Hospital

by Nicola Whatmore
An extra £6 million is to be spent on Heatherwood Hospital, Ascot, as health chiefs try desperately to save cash elsewhere in the district.
East Berkshire Health Authority has produced a strategy plan to turn Heatherwood into a general hospital.
At the moment Bracknell people have to travel to Slough, Windsor or Frimley for many hospital services.
In January the health authority released details of plans to improve acute services at Heatherwood and to build a community hospital in Bracknell. But this week health chiefs revealed new plans to spend a total of £16 million on the hospital.
They also want to bring the improvement plans forward and work could start on new wards by the end of next year.
But the project which has delighted Bracknell people has caused fury in Windsor and Iver. Their hospitals would lose facilities to finance the Ascot scheme. East Berkshire MP Andrew MacKay has been called on to intervene in the increasingly bitter fight.
A full meeting of Bracknell District Council voted unanimously this week to call upon the East Berkshire Community Health Council to demand the same level of hospital care in Bracknell as in other areas in the district.
An 11,000 signature petition from Windsor residents protesting against the proposals was handed to East Berkshire Health Authority chairman Don McWilliams on Friday.
But Bracknell Councillor Mary Coombs said: "We have been campaigning for years to get more hospital facilities in East Berkshire and at long last the authority is recognising this.
"I think the campaign is appalling the people of Windsor are being very selfish," she fumed. The measures will provide more beds, wards and operating theatres for Heatherwood. To meet the costs Windsor's King Edward VII general hospital is to lose beds and become a community hospital. And Iver Cottage hospital, near Windsor is to close. Total savings will be around £200,000. According to Berkshire County Council figures, the number of residents in Bracknell over 75 will rise by 16 per cent by 1996 and pensioners will go up by 8 per cent.
The population in Windsor and Maidenhead is set for only a 2 per cent rise. Leader of the Save Iver Hospital Campaign Eileen Francis claims Bracknell Councillors have been mislead by what a community health hospital would involve.
"The Bracknell community hospital is only going to have about 70 or 80 beds for the elderly and it is not going to serve the community of Bracknell," she said.
Councillor Bill Wregglesworth disagreed: "A community hospital certainly will provide help for the elderly, but will also provide convalescence beds for patients who can't recover at home, such as mums with young children," he said.
Members of East Berkshire Community Health Council met members of the health authority on Tuesday.
They said the authority's consultation document was not detailed enough But Mrs Coombs stressed the need for more hospital services near Bracknell. "It is ridiculous to expect people from Bracknell to travel to Windsor,"she said. The health authority is now to consider the CHC's full written reply.
Extract Bracknell Times 05/05/1988

 

Hospital Plan Useless

A strategy governing local hospitals over the next ten years has been dismissed as "useless"" by health workers, unions and an official health body.
The consultation document called the "mid-term strategy", drawn up by East Berks Health Authority, was condemned at a local health meeting recently.
The main theme of the plan is to keep Wexham Park Hospital and Heatherwood Hospital, in Ascot, as district general ones, and reduce all others to the status of community hospitals, providing more beds for the elderly.
The plan came under fire at East Berks Community Health Council's meeting last week, when various groups turned up to lodge their opposition.
Nora Saunders, chairman of the Beaconsfield Liberals, attacked the proposed closure of Iver Hospital, which is a cost-cutting part of the strategy.
She claimed the decision to close the hospital, which now rests with health minister John Moore, would push the elderly into other hospitals, where beds are twice as expensive.
And she added, while more geriatric beds were being provided within the strategy, there was a disregard for the young, who may need acute surgical and medical beds.
"In time it will mean fewer of us will survive to become elderly and the problem will be solved in one fell swoop," she said.
Stan Simmonds, consultant obstetrician at Windsor's King Edward V11 Hospital, said his main criticism was a lack of information on alternatives." The document is at best insulting and at the worst useless," he said.
Brian Rockell, community Health council chairman, referred to the document as "lightweight in answers and lacking in facts".
The council refuses to accept the closure of Iver Hospital, which will be one of the major sources of funding the plan, and does not consider community hospitals should be restricted to caring for the elderly.
It wants to know why acute beds are being dramatically reduced and says not enough attention has been given to the implications of the plan on other services provided by the health authority.
"It is difficult to make pertinent and knowledgeable comments without the comprehensive details that should accompany a full consultation document like this," said Mr. Rockell. Peter Stanley, representing health workers unions in East Berks, and Val Price of the King Edward VII Hospital Defence Committee, said they would not support the plan for similar reasons.
Extract Buckinghamshire Advertiser 11/05/1988

 

Centre Ready to Offer Advice to Mentally Ill

When Bracknell's MIND drop-in centre for the mentally ill opens its doors in early July, it will not be short of people who need help.
Dr Graham Goul, a consultant psychiatrist at Ascot's Heatherwood Hospital, said this week that up to ten per cent of Bracknell people will suffer some form of mental breakdown in their life.
One in every hundred will suffer from schizophrenia, one of the worst forms of mental illness.
One in every hundred will suffer from manic depression while five or six per cent of the Bracknell population will suffer from "significant depression." And one in every ten people walking in Bracknell High Street or sitting in your local pub will suffer an anxiety attack that will significantly affect their daily life.
Dr Goul said: "Mental illness is a significant problem in the Bracknell and East Berkshire area and happens to more people than most imagine."
With the closure of St Bernard's hospital in Ealing, London, where most of East Berkshire's mentally ill were treated, a new programme for the mentally ill has been developed.
Heatherwood Hospital recently opened its short stay mental illness unit which can cater for up to 50 patients.
But the current thinking is not to lock people away but to return them to the community.
This is where the new MIND centre in Bracknell will come in, offering support and advice to out patients and anyone else who feels they are near the edge.
Extract Bracknell Times 12/05/1988

 

Hospital's cash loss

Thoughtless patients are costing a Berkshire hospital thousands of pounds by not returning crutches when they have finished with them
Heatherwood Hospital in Ascot spent £11.000 replacing crutches last year with Windsor's King Edward VII Hospital forking out a further £500
Heatherwood physiotherapy superintendent Bernadette Burt said: "We are losing a lot of money that should be used on operating equipment and the problem is getting worse.
"We have even found crutches thrown onto dumping sites.
"People are supposed to return the crutches when they come back for treatment but they forget to bring them.
"We have even introduced a system where people can return the crutches to local clinics, but without success."
The hospital is now considering introducing £5 deposits for each pair it lends out.
"We don't want to do this but we have been forced into it," Miss Burt said. "Obviously the elderly and people on benefits would be exempt."
Extract Evening Post 20/05/1988 & Wokingham Times 02/06/1988

 

Now It's £10,789

The Chiltern Cheshire NewHomeAppeal, backed by the Advertiser, has reached £10,879 in just under six weeks. Support is still vital to reach the £m target which will buy a new home for 18 residents made homeless after a fire wrecked their North Park home, Gerrards Cross, last month.
Since then the residents, who suffer from varied physical disabilities, have been housed at local and not so local hospitals.
Many are now at the Licensed Victuallers Nursing Home, Denham, and the rest are at Heatherwood Hospital, Ascot.
The fund raising committee of the home has set itself an autumn deadline for the first two wings of the new home.
Extract Buckinghamshire Advertiser 01/06/1988

 

Hospital Revamped For Extra Patients

Heatherwood hospital's accident and emergency unit is to be overhauled to take extra patients from Maidenhead.
East Berkshire District Health Authority wants to save £43,000 by closing the A and E unit at St Marks Hospital, Maidenhead.
On Friday it got support for its decision from Oxford Area Health Authority and this will now go to Health Secretary John Moore for final approval.
Health officials say Heatherwood is to have a comprehensive 24-hour accident service.
The Community Health Council said the Maidenhead closure was not in patients' best interests.
East Berkshire health authority member Nelson Bland, also a Wokingham District Councillor, said improvements were already being made at Heatherwood, including the appointment of a second A and E consultant.
He said: "In practice the Maidenhead unit has been as good as closed for some years because it was difficult to get cover for it.
"A lot of work has already gone into Heatherwood to improve it."
Extract Bracknell & Wokingham Times 09/06/1988

 

Residents Re-united

Chiltern Cheshire Home residents had mixed feelings on Monday as they left the nursing home which had given them shelter, to be reunited with their friends. Nine, residents, who have been staying at the Licensed Victuallers National Home at Denham Green, have joined other residents in ward 11 at Heatherwood Hospital, Ascot.
All the residents of the North Park home were left in the care of local hospitals when their building was ravaged by fire in April.
It is the first time the residents have been together since then and many expressed happiness at the thought.
But there was also tears in many eyes as they thanked the matron of the Denham Green home, Pat Challis for her hospitality.
"I am very sad to be leaving," said Jenny Connell, "especially all the new friends I have made here."
Shirley Hughes, head of care of the Chiltern Cheshire Home, Said: "Everyone has been absolutely marvellous here and we thank them for their co-operation and help."
Mrs Challis said she was sorry to see them go. "I will really miss them," she said. The nine residents joined seven already at the Ascot hospital, and a married couple who have been staying at the Chiltern Cheshire home in Bedfordshire.
It is expected they will be at Heatherwood until the end of October.
Extract Buckinghamshire Advertiser 15/06/1988

Comment:- The above article was accompanied by a photo.
The caption Pat Challis matron of the Licenced Victuallers home at Denham green,chats with Chiltern Cheshire home residents who have been staying there.
Copyright prevents us from displaying the photo here.

 

Not Opening

Bracknell MP Andrew MacKay visited Heatherwood Hospital's new mental unit on an informal basis and not to officially open it, as stated in the Times issue of June 2.
The opening ceremony will take place later this year.
Extract Bracknell & Wokingham Times 16/06/1988

 

Temps Shortage To Affect Hospital

Bracknell is facing a hospital crisis this summer unless temporary skilled secretaries can be found, health chiefs have warned.
And the situation could get so bad that after care treatment may be delayed for weeks.
Ascot's Heatherwood Hospital, which serves Bracknell district, has a severe shortage of medical secretaries. These are skilled people who act as personal assistants to doctors and surgeons at the hospital.
The hospital says it "faces I severe difficulties in covering summer leave by medical secretaries" and is appealing for trained medical secretaries to come forward.
Heatherwood Unit General Manager John Neate said: "The shortage is likely to last from the second week in July to the first week in September." And the hospital may have to use staff provided by private agencies to fill the gap, costing over twice as much to employ.
The work of a medical secretary is so technical that ordinary typists are unable to cover the duties.
Shortages
Mr Neate said the area most likely to be hit by the staff shortage is the outpatient department, which gives former patients of the hospital after care treatment.
The out-patient department sees around 1,000 patients a week and health bosses say unless medical secretaries can be found for the summer, normal hospital services will suffer.
One reason for the long term shortage is that pay in East Berkshire is not high enough to attract people from other parts of the country to come and work here.
Mr Neate said: "We are subject to national terms and conditions which do not reflect the cost of living in various areas of the country.
Mr Neate is calling on trained medical secretaries living in East Berkshire to consider working part-time during part of the summer to avoid any serious short fall is hospital services.
If you are trained medical secretary and would like to help, contact John Neate at Heatherwood Hospital, Ascot or call him on Ascot, 23333.
Extract Bracknell Times 16/06/1988

 

Snag Halts Reunion

Plans for Chiltern Cheshire Home Residents to be reunited for the first time since April's fire were hit by a last minute snag.
The residents who have been staying at the Licensed Victuallers National Home in Denham were going to join other residents already at Heatherwood hospital, last week.
But, just hours before they set off, they received a phone call halting their plans. A senior consultant at the Ascot hospital decided not enough thought had been given to the scheme.
Colin Reeves, senior manager of the ward in which residents were to be temporarily housed, said there were still problems over catering for the number of people using the ward.
He explained that originally the ward was free because they had been unable to staff it for their own purposes, so it was offered to the home.
Since then, staff have been found and some patients admitted.
Pat Challis, matron of the Denham nursing home, said many of the Cheshire residents were upset by news.
"They were extremely disappointed especially after having geared themselves up and getting themselves mentally ready for the move," she said. "We had just finished a farewell lunch."
The move will go ahead when all the problems have been ironed out at Heatherwood said Mr Reeves.
Extract Buckinghamshire Advertiser 22/06/1988

 

Bus link Inquiry

Bus services will have to be improved to make a new health plan work, says East Berks Area Health Authority.
At a meeting last week a mid-term strategy was agreed that will make Heatherwood at Ascot and Wexham Park, Slough, the two main general hospitals for the district.
But bus services will need to improve as one is in the north and the other in the south of the area. Chairman Dr Donald McWilliams said a working party had been set up to discuss the matter with local bus companies.
The authority admits travelling to Wexham and Heatherwood is a problem.
The new plan makes more use of community hospitals and local out-patients departments at Slough, Windsor, Maidenhead and Ascot. Mr McWilliams is urging the working party to report back as soon as possible.
Extract Buckinghamshire Advertiser 22/06/1988

 

Hospital's secs appeal

Health chiefs in East Berkshire are breathing a sign of relief this week following news that a major health service crisis has been avoided.
Managers at Ascot's Heatherwood Hospital, which serves Bracknell district, say they have now got enough stand-in medical secretaries for their out patient department this summer.
Last week The TIMES printed a plea from Heatherwood's Unit General Manager John Neate for temporary medical secretaries to cover summer leave at the hospital.
If at least four medical secretaries could not have been found by the end of July, there was a danger out patient facilities could have suffered.
Extract Bracknell & Wokingham Times 23/06/1988

 

Fire Creates Refugees

The fire which ravaged the Gerrards Cross premises of the Chiltern Cheshire Home in April has made "refugees" of its 18 physically handicapped residents, and threatens the very future of the Home.
Since the April 5 early morning fire, which killed one of the residents, the remaining patients have spent an "unhappy and insecure" 10 weeks trying to find suitable accommodation. Outlining the problems now facing the Home, Shirley Hughes, head of care, said the situation was becoming desperate, and the Home was now "fighting for its life".
"We are now left with four horrendous problems," Mrs Hughes explained: An urgent need for about £50 000 to solve our immediate cash flow problems and get us out of debt;
The need to house the residents, preferably free of charge, in a place where they can be together and within easy reach of Gerrards Cross;
The need to raise £750 000 in the next two weeks to ensure a start can be made on a new Home in Packhorse Road;
To find an active and enthusiastic fund-raiser to tackle raising funds for the new project.
At present the 18 former residents, whose rescue from the flames elicited praise for both staff at the Home and the fire services, are staying in temporary accommodation at three different sites: Seven in the psychiatric wing of Heatherwood Hospital, Ascot; Nine at the Licensed Victuallers Nursing Home at Denham; And two at Agate House Cheshire Home in Ampthill.
An emergency meeting of the Cheshire Foundation last week suggested that the residents be "dispersed" to other Cheshire Homes in Britain, their North Park (Gerrards Cross) home be sold, and the proceeds used to build a new home at Packhorse Road.
"This makes good financial sense," Mrs Hughes commented. "However, it is people and not goods we would be despatching.
Physically handicapped people who have been through the trauma of a fire at night have since been housed in four different places, making them insecure and unhappy.
"To completely uproot them and send them anything up to 300 miles away from their families and friends would be to pass a death sentence on some, and at best a risk of mental disturbance on others," Mrs Hughes said.
This option was rejected by the Home's management committee this week. The problem though is that the Ampthill Home can no longer keep two of the residents in lodging, and the Denham site is having a building repair programme delayed because of the Chiltern Home
Extract Buckinghamshire Advertiser 24/06/1988

 

Homes Shock for Founder

Residents of the Chiltern Cheshire Home were delighted when the charity's founder, Gp Capt Leonard Cheshire VC, paid a flying visit last week.
But the 70-year-old charity worker was shocked when he saw the extent of damage and suffering the fire had caused to the Gerrards Cross home and its residents.
Shirley Hughes, head of care at the home, escorted Gp Capt Cheshire round the smoke-blackened home in North Park, and round the Denham nursing home where many of the residents are lodging.
"He listened attentively to what people had to say about their experiences and he was horrified at how bad the fire had been," she said.
"Unfortunately, he could not stay as long as he would have liked, as he had just returned from Africa," she said.
Gp Capt Cheshire has been working there on a project with his wife Sue Ryder.
He did say he wanted to visit other residents at Heatherwood Hospital staying at Ascot before leaving.
Extract Buckinghamshire Advertiser 29/06/1988

  Diary July to December 1988