Staff concerns over the safety of patients following plans to revamp a mental health unit should not be ignored Antoinette Sandbach AM is urging.
Patients could be moved from Ysbyty Gwynedd’s Hergest Unit to Bodelwyddan’s crisis-hit Ablett unit, where a ward was suddenly shut on December 19 after a serious incident occurred, with some nursing staff “taken out of clinical practice”.
A police investigation is underway into what happened at the 17-bed Tawel Fan ward, which closed and patients moved to a Colwyn Bay unit. The ward is part of Glan Clwyd Hospital’s Ablett Unit, where killer Deyan Deyanov was detained.
Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board meets on January 23 to discuss the future of the Hergest and Ablett units but staff have raised concerns over patient safety. They also warn that patients could be forced to be treated at English hospitals – at a cost of £100,000 each.
It follows a surprise visit to Bangor just before Christmas by a team from watchdog Healthcare Inspectorate Wales (HIW). Their report pinpointed low staff morale, poor professional relationships, safety issues, concerns over mixing mentally ill patients with frail elderly ones, and the need for single sex wards.
The 42-bed Hergest Unit at Ysbyty Gwynedd, Bangor, has been the focus of several reviews, with the latest a report by the Royal College of Psychiatrists, plus BCUHB is due to receive soon a report following 35 whistle-blowing allegations.
More than 40 staff, from nurses through to consultants, have backed a round robin to NHS Wales, asking for high-level intervention and calling for a re-think on proposals. They want a ward that has lain mostly empty for three years to be brought back into service, and so ease over-crowding.
Staff are also warning that the plans for improvement will lead to the closure of a Hergest ward for frail elderly patients, with patients moved to a ward on the Ablett Unit at Ysbyty Glan Clwyd.
“Once again, it seems there is stunning management incompetence at the Health Board, and at these two units in particular,” said Ms Sandbach. “The changes at Hergest will reduce bed numbers there, which staff tell me has been the safest ward in North Wales.
“There have obviously been a lot of problems at this ward, but ignoring the valid concerns of staff, including very senior members, does not help. It’s about time managers actually listened to those dealing with patients.
“And we should be told exactly what has been going on Tawel Fan and the Ablett Unit. No more hiding behind closed doors.”
In their letter to NHS Wales chief executive David Sissling, staff warn that West Conwy patients will have to be treated in the Ablett Unit at Bodelwyddan, in a ward ear-marked for bringing back patients now being cared for in England, at a cost of £100,000 per patient.
And it could mean patients from Holyhead or Dolgellau facing 100-mile trips to Bodelwyddan for treatment.
Consultant David Healy calls the plans a “panicky knee-jerk reaction,” in the letter to Mr Sissling, and said that staff were “warned the unit may even close”.
“We believe it requires someone in a position of authority to get to grips finally with the problems being created by the management f the mental health CPG
“It is certain that things will go badly wrong with the proposed plan. It seems equally certain that staff rather than management will be blamed.“
A HIW report is due soon on the Ablett Unit’s treatment of Deyan Deyanov , who beheaded a woman a year after he was a patient there.
Deyanov decapitated Jennifer Mills-Westley in a Tenerife supermarket in May 2011. Her daughters said Deyanov had been failed and lessons must be learned, and called for a review into mental health services.
