Hants NHS hospital becomes first to be run by private sector
pharmafile | January 3, 2007 | News story | |Â Â Â
Lymington New Forest Hospital has become the first NHS facility in England to be run entirely by the private sector.
Colchester-based Partnership Health Group, which is partly owned by Care UK, has won the contract to run the £36 million, purpose-built, 60-bed Hampshire hospital. NHS doctors and nurses will work with medical staff employed by PHG.
This is the first time an entire NHS hospital has been contracted out to a privately-run firm and is another turn in the government's much-publicised wheel to bring down waiting times to 18 weeks by the end of 2008.
It is widely expected that the Lymington contract will be the forerunner of similar deals and is seen as yet another symbol of the growing and inevitable push towards outsourcing health provision from the NHS into the private sector.
It will provide more than 13,000 operations and other medical treatments a year, including urgent care services with a state-of-the-art medical admissions unit, a minor injuries unit and X-ray facilities.
Mike Parish, Care UK's chief executive, said: "If the Department of Health is to achieve its objective of truly plural provision for NHS patients, that has to involve the transfer of existing assets and services as well as new build by the private sector for NHS patients."
Southampton City PCT said the move was part of its long-term drive to develop the Royal South Hants Hospital site, based in the city, as a top-class health campus for the 500,000 people living in and around the area.
However, health workers' union Unison, has condemned the deal as an enormous gamble.
Karen Jennings, Unison's head of health, said: "The Department of Health has always maintained that the whole point of using private hospitals was to add to capacity – not to take over the NHS. This contract contradicts that pledge."
She added: "This is taking an enormous gamble with people's healthcare as, unlike the NHS, this consortia has never run emergency services nor intensive care facilities.
"We fear this is the first wave and as PCTs reorganise their local health services, it may be rolled out across other parts of the country."
Grant Rex, PHG's managing director, said: "We are privileged to have been appointed as preferred bidder for this ground-breaking and strategically important project. We look forward to working with the staff at the Royal South Hants and Lymington New Forest hospitals in providing significantly enhanced acute and community services for NHS patients."
Southampton City PCT chief executive Brian Skinner said local NHS organisations had been working very closely over the past two years on the future of the Royal South Hants site. He explained: "With a more community-based focus, the site will offer much improved primary care services for residents across central Southampton, and the independent sector will play a vital role in helping us deliver this."
The opening of Lymington New Forest Hospital comes as three other contracts were signed to provide outsourced diagnostic services for the NHS in London, the Midlands, and the north and south west of England.
Leading IT services company Atos Origin has clinched a five-year contract with the Department of Health to provide more than 450,000 diagnostic tests each year from more than 60 fixed locations and 17 mobile test centres.
Mercury Health has also signed a five year contract with the health department to provide up to 190,000 diagnostic tests a year, while Netcare has made a similar deal, catering for up to 220,000 tests per annum over the next five years.
These contracts form part of the overall NHS Diagnostics Programme, which, according to the Department of Health, is worth approximately £1 billion over five years.
