Nurses warn of rural ‘healthcare desert’

PATIENTS in rural areas are being forced to spend £100 on taxis to attend routine hospital appointments amid the closure of local services, nurses have warned.

The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) said the countryside was becoming a “healthcare desert”, with 10million people struggling to access GP appointments and hospital treatment.

Poor broadband and mobile phone signals, unreliable public and patient transport and the closure of local services were all to blame for increasingly inadequate healthcare provision in rural areas.

The RCN claims came as the head of the NHS raised concern that small hospitals were being “hollowed out” with threats to further services because of shortages of doctors and nurses.

Nurses said people living in rural areas were facing 60-mile round trips to their nearest major hospital for outpatient appointments, after the closure of services closer to their homes.

The RCN’S annual congress in Liverpool will hear today how ambulances can take nearly an hour to reach patients with life-threatening conditions in parts of the country, while nurses have warned that plans for a “digital first” NHS are doomed because huge swathes of the countryside cannot get basic 3G mobile phone coverage.

Dawne Garrett, the RCN’S professional lead for older people and dementia, said: “It’s time for the Government

‘It’s time to review rural healthcare ... a digital NHS isn’t going to work if we can’t even get a mobile signal’

to review healthcare provision in rural areas, and to introduce a fully funded staffing strategy so the countryside doesn’t become a healthcare desert.

“A digital NHS isn’t going to work if we can’t even get a mobile signal.”

A spokesman for the Department of Health and Social Care said it was investing an extra £4.5billion per year in primary and community care “as well as unlocking the potential of technology to provide patients with more options” and the Government was “working hard” to improve rural connectivity.