After months of campaigning, tens of thousands of signatures on the town MP’s petition, and dozens of articles by the Burton Mail, Burton’s Queen’s Hospital has been given its clearest signal yet that its A&E department will stay open.
A forward-planning document looking at health provision in Staffordshire had cast doubt on the department’s future, with the threat it could be downgraded to an urgent care centre meaning the town would lose its 24-hour emergency care cover.
But now it has been confirmed by the Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG), which decides how funding is spent in the area, that it has no plans to close the vital facility.
The news comes as the department records some of the best waiting time results in the entire country, reaching a target of seeing all patients within four hours.
The continued future of the thriving A&E department has now been confirmed by bosses at the hospital and the CCG.
However the final decision on the Staffordshire Sustainability and Transformation Plan (STP), which is re-shaping the way services are offered in the NHS, is not due out until later this summer.
Read more at the Burton Mail, 17th March 2016