Admissions suspended at Withernsea Hospital

City Health Care Partnership CIC (CHCP CIC) has today decided to temporarily halt admissions to community beds at Withernsea Community Hospital because of staff shortages and the ability to provide high quality continuity of care, pending a decision by the Secretary of State for Health.

NHS East Riding of Yorkshire Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) supports this decision.

The community beds have only minimal occupancy at present, but current patients will not be affected, as they will remain on the ward until they are assessed as being ready to be discharged and CHCP CIC will work with patients and their relatives to make sure this happens as smoothly as possible. It is expected that the last patient will be discharged by the end of August 2017.

In March, the CCG made decisions on the future of urgent care services across the region, which included permanently closing the ward in Withernsea to redesign services and workforce to support more people in alternative settings, in either Active Recovery beds (previously called Time to Think beds) or their own homes. Active Recovery beds are in a care home setting and used to improve discharge from hospital for patients who are medically fit but need complex packages of care or equipment to be put in place before they return home.

These decisions were referred to the Secretary of State for Health by East Riding of Yorkshire Council’s Health, Care and Wellbeing Overview and Scrutiny Committee and the outcome is yet to be decided.