Cancer and heart surgery cancelled to cope with virus
URGENT operations have apparently been cancelled and “unstable” patients sent home in order to free hospital space for coronavirus cases.
The incidents come amid fears the National Health Service is preparing to announce the widespread suspension of routine care to cope with a flood of patients with Covid-19. GPS have been instructed to conduct appointments only by phone or video unless a physical exam is deemed absolutely necessary, it was reported last night.
In one case, Wayne Randall, a painter and decorator from Kent, claims he was told last week that his double heart bypass operation could not go ahead as planned on Monday because staff needed to prepare for the virus.
The 39-year-old said: “I’ve been trying my hardest to get my courage up for Monday, with great stress, just to be told it’s cancelled. It’s so up and down,
‘I’ve been getting my courage up for double bypass surgery only for it to be cancelled. It’s not good for my heart’
it’s really not good for my heart with the state it’s in. I’m not well at all.”
Meanwhile a neurology patient at The Royal London Hospital, which is part of Barts Health NHS Trust, was told to get ready to go home despite not having a clear diagnosis and still being in pain with a bladder problem.
In Inverness, a woman who had waited six months for an operation for suspected ovarian cancer was informed the procedure could not go ahead “due to the global pandemic”.
The reports suggest that despite NHS leaders not yet issuing guidance, individual hospital trusts are taking matters into their own hands. New advice is widely anticipated in the coming days, but this is expected to allow the cancellation of non-emergency operations, rather than treatment for cancer and other serious conditions. The incidents come as NHS leaders call on health chiefs to scrap financial efficiency to allow them to cope with the outbreak.
Sarah-jane Marsh, chief executive of the Birmingham Women’s and Children’s Foundation Trust, said removing all cost improvement plan requirements for trusts would be “one of the best things the government could do for the NHS now”.
New national rules for hospital visiting have also been issued which advise trusts to minimise patient visits to “only essential visitors that are required for patient welfare”.
A spokesman for Barts Health NHS Trust said: “We continually work hard to safely discharge patients back to the community. We would never discharge a patient unless we are confident that their clinical and safeguarding requirements are being met.”
♦intensive care experts are drawing up best practice guidelines which suggest hospitals should prioritise patients who are more likely to survive and stop treating severely ill coronavirus victims if the outbreak escalates, the Daily Mail reported.