Dr Poulter met with representatives from the Hartismere Hospital League of Friends Group, where they raised concerns about the ongoing provision of community care beds at Harismere Place Care Home in Eye.
These community care beds at Hartismere Place are vitally important in providing close to home step down care and rehabilitation for people who have been discharged from Ipswich or West Suffolk Hospitals, but who are still unable to care for themselves more independently at home. Many patients living in Eye and in Northern Suffolk recovering from a stroke or a broken hip have benefitted from the opportunity of the high quality rehabilitation and care that the beds at Hartismere Place provide.
These beds also help to improve patient flow at Ipswich and West Suffolk Hospitals and prevent ‘bed blocking’ by patients who are medically fit for discharge, but who need additional rehabilitation before they can return to living at home. The importance of these beds is, of course, even greater as we approach the medically busy winter period.
Quality of care provided for patients at Hartismere Place is good, and there are also integrated facilities for patients’ rehabilitation and other care needs only a few yards away at Hartismere Hospital. Caring for a patient in a bed at Hartismere Place equates to around a third of the cost of a bed in an acute hospital like Ipswich.
Dr Dan has called upon Ipswich and East Suffolk Clinical Commissioning Group to ensure that the provision of these essential community care beds continues, and to work with Care UK and Hartismere Hospital to look to increasing the capacity.