Council says local NHS review must make sense to communities

The local review of NHS services, including hospital care must address the needs of communities in the borough and eastern Shropshire and any decision must balance these issues equally with clinical needs Telford & Wrekin Council says.

Top of the list of community needs are: the journey time for people to get to any main hospital; much higher levels of disadvantage and deprivation in Telford and Wrekin and the link this has to health needs; access to services in rural east Shropshire; and the impact which moving services could have on the long-term viability of the Princess Royal Hospital (PRH) and the wider Shrewsbury and Telford Hospitals NHS Trust.

The review's recommendations show that more than one in three people in the catchment area served by the two hospitals (36% in Shropshire and Telford and Wrekin) live within 20 minutes' drive of the PRH, while less than one in four (23%) live within the same drive time of the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital (RSH).

It also shows that of Shropshire residents, 62 % live within 20-40 minutes drive from the PRH, while only 44 % are within the same drive time of the RSH.

Telford and Wrekin's rapid growth and bigger population will also widen the population gap further. In particular, the Council points to the number of new homes due to be built in the borough by 2026, compared with Shropshire, which should see the borough's population top 200,000.

The call comes as the NHS in Shropshire and Telford and Wrekin has published a series of recommendatio