FRIMLEY Health NHS Foundation Trust has given its reassurance that major services do not face the axe, after BBC analysis of NHS local hospital plans revealed the Frimley Health area, which includes Farnham, will have a funding shortfall of £236 million by 2020/21 if cost-cutting proposals do not work.
The Frimley Health and Care System Sustainability and Transformation Plan (STP), pulling together councils, the NHS and community partners, is based on the principle of ‘spending to save’, with £69m to be invested over the next four years in front-line NHS and care services to improve waiting times, treatment and home care for local people.
It includes an extra £7m every year to ensure people can get a GP appointment from 8am to 8pm Monday to Friday, as well as plans to work with people to tackle preventable ill health, including help for 18,000 people to prevent diabetes, reduce alcohol-related deaths by two per cent, and reduce surgical infections by 150 a year by encouraging people to give up smoking for three weeks before their operation.
At weekends, it is proposed that specialist and family doctors, community nurses, occupational therapists, physiotherapists, social workers, psychiatric nurses, psychiatrists and pharmacists will offer treatment at the 14 new ‘health hubs’.