Agenda item

Report of the Mental Health Services for Older Persons Durham Community Service Manager

The Committee considered a briefing note on the Reconfiguration of TEWV County Durham and Darlington Mental Health Services for Older People (MHSOP) Community Teams that highlighted the proposed changes and why they were proposing the changes (for copy of note, see file of minutes).

Cheryl Burton, General Manager Mental Health Services for Older Persons and Christie Murphy, Service Manager for Mental Health Services for Older Persons were in attendance to present the report and answer questions.

Mrs Gott referred to team one and that the area of the service was being extended and asked if they were extending the number of staff and beds and asked for an explanation on how this would work in practice.

The Service Manager responded that they were extending into Teesdale but they had taken away Sedgefield North PCN, in terms of the population covered it was reduced. From a travel point of view the team already visited Weardale and the base they used was the Richardson Hospital for the Teesdale patients, so she did not think that travel time would increase for that team.

In response to a further question from Mrs Gott regarding travelling times for those effected, the Service Manager indicated that they would continue to see the Teesdale patients in the Richardson Hospital at Barnard Castle if this was where they were currently seen. The only GP practice where the travel time would be extended was Gainford as it was closer to Darlington which was a small number of patients and they would look at each case individually and commented that the majority of the patients were seen in their home so that it was staff who were travelling and not patients in the main.

Councillor Quinn asked where Shildon fit into this as some residents had practices in Bishop Auckland, Shildon and Bishop Auckland and asked where the dividing line was.

The Service Manager responded that if they were currently at Bishop Auckland then they would be staying with Bishop Auckland but she would confirm the GP Practices.

Councillor Savoury indicated that Stanhope to Barnard Castle was 30 minutes and 17 miles and was concerned about timescales and the workload of staff. She stated that services were already stretched and asked if it was wise to increase capacity to people’s workloads that was a rural area and patients still deserved those services.

The Service Manager responded that Stanhope was already covered by Bishop Auckland but they were not travelling to Spennymoor and beyond areas so this would reduce the amount of travel for staff and allow them to concentrate on Bishop Auckland and West into the Dales.

The General Manager indicated that they had looked at staff and had moved staff around teams where they needed to. If there was an increase in resource requirement, they had moved staff accordingly to counteract that.

Councillor Haney indicated that most patients had home visits.

The Service Manager responded that they were exploring the use of satellite clinics with adult colleagues and recognised asking people to travel was not ideal for the older population. They were exploring using the Chester-Le-Street Health Centre and continuing to use Bowes Lyon Ward, Lanchester Road Hospital, they were going to work with the patients to see which location fits with them.

In response to the earlier question from Councillor Quinn, the Service Manager confirmed that GP Practices in Sedgefield North were Bishops Close, St. Andrews, Ferryhill, West Cornforth and Skerne that would be part of Durham.

Resolved: That the information contained within the report be noted.