| Last month health secretary Jeremy Hunt announced he would accept the proposals of the trust special administrator to downgrade services at Lewisham, but that a smaller A&E would be retained, with “24/7 senior medical cover”. Mr Hunt said that after taking advice from NHS medical director Sir Bruce Keogh he believed the new unit would be able to see approximately three-quarters of the patients who currently attended Lewisham A&E. However, Mike Clancy, president of the College of Emergency Medicine, said this afternoon that his organisation did not recognise the proposed replacement department as an A&E. He revealed in a message on social networking site Twitter that he had sent a letter to the NHS Commissioning Board in which he “raised questions about the lack of clarity [around the Lewisham proposals]”. Dr Clancy added: “What’s proposed doesn’t meet our definition of an ED [emergency department]”. The news comes one day before a deadline set by Lewisham Council for the health secretary to withdraw the plan or face a judicial review. The local authority believes the trust special administrator acted outside of his powers because he was appointed to South London Healthcare Trust, but made a recommendation to downgrade services run by neighbouring Lewisham Healthcare Trust. The situation is further complicated by the fact that the College of Emergency Medicine is working with Sir Bruce on his review of policy on emergency and urgent care services. The NHS Commissioning Board project is successor to a review of the nomenclature of A&E departments ordered by the Department of Health last year. |