We're Ready! Royal Surrey urges patients to take up treatment | News

Royal Surrey’s staff are urging local people to take up their hospital appointments, as the Trust drives forward to catch up now that the Covid-19 emergency has eased.

Staff have starred in a new short video to encourage patients to come in for surgery when it’s their turn, as over 100 patients are delaying treatment because of difficulties of self-isolating, before or after treatment, and because of safety fears around Covid-19.

Watch this short video on our YouTube channel.

Royal Surrey was able to keep its cancer surgery running throughout the pandemic, while some other routine operations were paused. Now all of its theatres are running at full speed, Louise Stead, Chief Executive, is asking patients to help the Trust get moving as quickly as possible by taking up appointments when they are offered.  

Chief Executive of Royal Surrey NHS Foundation Trust, Louise Stead, said: “We are on a mission to see non-urgent patients as quickly as possible and give people the treatment they need at the earliest opportunity. Please help us by taking up appointments when we offer them.

“We understand that family and work commitments, combined with the complexities of self-isolating, can make it hard to schedule surgery but we need our community to put their health first whenever they can.

“If our patients delay appointments, our staff spend extra hours trying to fill these spaces.We need our theatres and our fantastic team of surgeons to work at full capacity to help all our patients who are waiting for life-changing treatment.”

At the outbreak of the pandemic, Royal Surrey implemented many safety measures that remain in place, such as one-way systems in the hospital and drive-thru services to aid social distancing and limit footfall.

Royal Surrey staff wear appropriate PPE and are asked to take lateral flow tests for Covid-19 twice a week, while patients are asked to wear face coverings in the hospital.

Sam Huddart, Royal Surrey’s Theatre Clinical Risk Group Lead said: “We know that our patients worry about coming in to hospital, but I want to reassure our community that we do everything possible to limit this risk.

“Thanks to our purpose-built Covid-19 isolation unit, we are currently able to treat Covid-19 patients away from the main hospital site. Our teams are committed to patient safety and work very hard to provide the best possible experience for everyone in our care.”

Anyone with concerns about taking up an appointment should speak to their GP, the booking team who have made contact or the Consultant who is overseeing their care.

Royal Surrey is working hard to treat as many patients as efficiently as possible. Working as part of Surrey Heartlands Health and Care Partnership, Royal Surrey and other local NHS partners will receive a share of £160m in extra funding. This ‘elective accelerator’ programme will support the Trust to implement and evaluate innovative ways to increase the number of planned operations.