The Trust’s response to recent media stories, 22 October 2013:

Sue Moore, managing director for Good Hope Hospital, said “Good Hope delivers a wide range of surgery and we plan for this to remain the case in the future with strengthened and robust emergency medical services and specialist surgery.

“Service reviews, led by senior clinicians, are regularly undertaken in order to determine how best to meet the needs of our patients, now and in the future. It is important we look at potential options for doing things differently, because healthcare continues to change with advances in clinical practice.

“No decisions about any service changes have been made, as we are still at an early stage of appraising a number of potential options which have been developed over recent months. No changes to surgery would be made without extensive engagement with GPs and patients; and would be based on meeting Royal College standards and improving outcomes for patients.

“We expect to be in a position to share the options in early 2014, but can confirm we are totally committed to building a sustainable future for surgery at Good Hope to deliver the safest and best care possible to our patients. In fact there is potential to develop centres of excellence for a number of surgical specialties and therefore to treat patients from a wider geographical area.”