Knutsford ‘could have medical centre in five years’

More than 150 people packed into the Methodist Church last night to hear 15 years of battling for a combined medical centre had so far proved fruitless.

GP Dr Paddy Kearns said: “We're working out of four buildings, none of which are fit for purpose. We have clinicians who are working in Knutsford who can't see patients because there's no room.”

He said the GP practices now want to develop the Community Hospital site in Bexton Road – but this depended on the East Cheshire Trust and Cheshire East Council working with them and agreeing to sell the land.

The trust owns the hospital site, while the Stanley Centre and Bexton Court are council properties.

“We would then be able to build a completely new health and wellbeing centre, which would have all the doctors, nurses and all the other clinicians that work on that site plus, hospital specialists, plus all the diagnostics that we're going to need moving forward, plus all the community staff to be able to work together on that site,” said Dr Kearns.

He later told the meeting:  “We've been working with private finance and a developer and if we can use that land at the Community Hospital, there’s lots of other uses we can use it for as well, to subsidise the building of a health centre. Using the skills and the knowledge the private sector have, we won’t have to ask the NHS for capital funding.”

Dr Kearns stressed the plan was not for a GP surgery but a health and wellbeing centre.

Public meeting at Knutsford Methodist Church (Image: Knutsford Town Council)

He said he couldn’t pre-judge the outcome of the Stanley Centre [day care] consultation, which is underway at present, but he had made it clear the new building would have the provision to support people who need day care.

Tatton MP Esther McVey told the meeting: “The GPs have put together a plan of what they think is best and what is needed and how to care for your needs - and the council have a big part to play as well about the land, about the cost and how they can get their shoulder behind it to make it work.”

She urged residents to write to both the council and trust chief executives, adding ‘people power’ would play an important part.

Resident John Whitehead said the GPs’ proposal sounded like an excellent plan.

“Is there anything stopping us going ahead with that plan? he asked.

Mark Wilkinson, from NHS Cheshire and Merseyside, said three things were required - money, sites and partnership working.

He said the government and NHS is short on capital and the private sector was an option.

With regard to the Community Hospital site, he too referred to the public consultation on the future of the Stanley Centre.

And he said partnership working with the council, NHS and integrated care board was essential.

When asked by a resident how long it would be before a new centre would become operational, Mr Wilkinson said four to five years 'if everything worked out'.

Knutsford mayor Peter Coan, who chaired the meeting, had stressed at the outset nothing would be resolved that night.

He said talks would now be arranged with the relevant people at the NHS, Cheshire East and ICB about the proposals.

Residents were asked to write to the chief executives for Cheshire East Council and the East Cheshire NHS Trust urging them to support the idea of new combined medical centre at the Community Hospital site and Bexton Court and to prioritise it as a matter of urgency.

The contact details are:

Ged Murphy, chief executive, East Cheshire NHS Trust, Macclesfield District General Hospital, Victoria Road, Macclesfield. Email ecn-tr.CustomerCareService@nhs.net

Lorraine O’Donnell, chief executive, Cheshire East Council, Westfields, Middlewich Road, Sandbach. Email lorraine.odonnell@cheshireeast.gov.uk