Cancelled Surgeries in 'second wave'
Dear The Rotherham NHS Foundation Trust,
This foi request relates to the decision to suspend all 'non life threatening' operations in the week starting 26/10/2020 at Rotherham Hospital. The first two questions are for contextual information, followed by requests for specific information.
1. Please specify the date that this decision was made or finalised and who made this decision (either on their own or as part a joint decision).
2. Please clarify the exact criteria for which operations were to be cancelled, include any memorandums, informational emails etcetera that were circulated amounst the surgical teams or generally throughout the staff. This would include any 'if asked' statements.
3. Please state the number of operations booked for wednesday 28/10/2020 and how many were cancelled. Please do not include any surgical proceedures that were booked on the 27th or 28th (ie emergency proceedures).
3.1 Of those surgical proceedures booked and cancelled, how many were listed as 'urgent' and in 2 catagories (urgent and non urgent) how many had been previously booked and cancelled at least once before?
3.2 Of those patients who were originally due to have surgery (but were cancelled) on 28/10/2018 please anonymously provide the length of time each patient had been waiting.
4. Of patients who have had surgeries cancelled in the previous 7 days (21/10/2020 - 28/10/2010) how many have been offered alternative appointments.
5. Please provide the number of beds taken by Covid-19 patients in Rotherham hospital on 28/10/2018, the total number of beds within rotherham hospital and the number of free beds. Of the covid patients, how many required a) surgery b) the attention of surgical staff.
Yours faithfully,
Mr Pinsent
Dear Mr Pinsent
We are writing to acknowledge receipt of your request for information
under the Freedom of Information Act 2000. Your request has been assigned
the following reference number 5508 please could you quote this reference
number in any future correspondence relating to your request.
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Yours sincerely
Freedom of Information Office
The Rotherham NHS Foundation Trust
Dear Mr Pinsent
Thank you for your request for information dated 29 October 2020 under The
Freedom of Information Act 2000 (the FOI Act).
Decision:
The Rotherham NHS Foundation Trust does hold the information that you have
requested and has decided to release the information requested;
Your request: Our response:
This foi request relates to the decision to suspend
all 'non life threatening' operations in the week
starting 26/10/2020 at Rotherham Hospital. The first
two questions are for contextual information, followed
by requests for specific information.
1. Please specify the date that this decision was made
or finalised and who made this decision (either on
their own or as part a joint decision).
2. Please clarify the exact criteria for which
operations were to be cancelled, include any
memorandums, informational emails etcetera that were
circulated amounst the surgical teams or generally
throughout the staff. This would include any 'if
asked' statements.
Please see attached
3. Please state the number of operations booked for
wednesday 28/10/2020 and how many were cancelled.
Please do not include any surgical proceedures that
were booked on the 27th or 28th (ie emergency
proceedures).
3.1 Of those surgical proceedures booked and
cancelled, how many were listed as 'urgent' and in 2
catagories (urgent and non urgent) how many had been
previously booked and cancelled at least once before?
3.2 Of those patients who were originally due to have
surgery (but were cancelled) on 28/10/2018 please
anonymously provide the length of time each patient
had been waiting.
4. Of patients who have had surgeries cancelled in the
previous 7 days (21/10/2020 - 28/10/2010) how many
have been offered alternative appointments.
5. Please provide the number of beds taken by Covid-19
patients in Rotherham hospital on 28/10/2018, the
total number of beds within rotherham hospital and the
number of free beds. Of the covid patients, how many
required a) surgery b) the attention of surgical
staff.
We hope the above information satisfies your request
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Wilmslow
SK9 5AF
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Yours sincerely
Freedom of Information Office
The Rotherham NHS Foundation Trust
Dear The Rotherham NHS Foundation Trust,
Please pass this on to the person who conducts Freedom of Information reviews.
I am writing to request an internal review of The Rotherham NHS Foundation Trust's handling of my FOI request 'Cancelled Surgeries in 'second wave''.
Thankyou for your very prompt response. I am asking for a review of this data as the response appears to be either incorrect or incomplete. For example, point one describes the only cancellation as being decided on 28/10/2020, whereas the case I was involved with was cancelled two days before on 26/10/2020. The reason given at the time was that Rotherham had gone into Tier 3 and ALL "non-life threatening" operations had been cancelled - now the response to my FOI contradicts this and states only one operation was cancelled. While an understandable miscommunication may have occurred in the first instance it would not explain why the patient known to me was not given an alternative date or why the cancellation was not included in the response.
As another example the 1 patient was said to have been waiting for roughly 16 weeks, whereas the patient known to me (due to have surgery on 28/10/2020) had previously had surgery cancelled back in February which was double the quoted figure at over 36 weeks. There are other discrepancies and the minutes/other recorded data from the gold/silver meetings were not included as requested. I naturally understand and agree that any confidential information must and should be carefully redacted when sharing this information.
If you would be so kind as to review my FOI I would be very grateful as it appears there has been some confusion. If you would also be able to provide a data set of bed occupancy in the 7 days preceding 28/10/2020 for the HDU that would really help to contextualise the cancellations and validate the latter information provided. Thank you once more for your very impressive response time and professionalism.
A full history of my FOI request and all correspondence is available on the Internet at this address: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/c...
Yours faithfully,
Mr Pinsent
Dear Mr Pinsent
I write to acknowledge your request for an internal review of The
Rotherham NHS Foundation Trust’s response regarding your Freedom of
Information Act request made on 29 October 2020.
On 6 November 2020, the Trust responded to your request with the email
attached.
I will now undertake a review as requested. Unlike FOI requests, there is
no statutory time frame for carrying out internal reviews, but we aim to
provide a full response within 20 working days – in this case 9 December
2020. If it is not possible for us to reach a decision within 20 working
days, we will write to you again to keep you informed of our progress.
I apologise, for any inconvenience caused and will write further with an
outcome of the review and if we can be of any further assistance in the
meantime, please do not hesitate to contact us.
Regards,
Information Governance Manager
Dear Mr Pinsent,
Apologies for the delay in returning a response to your request as below
and attached.
I am in the process of clarifying information with the teams involved, and
currently due to operational pressures, this is taking longer than
expected. I do need additional clarification on some figures before
responding to your request but hope to have this with you by Friday 15th
January.
Again, please accept my apologies for this delay.
Kind Regards,
Information Governance Manager
Please use this email address for all replies to this request:
[2][FOI #702593 email]
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Sent on behalf of the Information Governance Manager
Dear Mr Pinsent
Please see attached the outcome of the review that you requested. Details
of any actions you may want to take next if you remain unsatisfied are
included in the document.
Kind regards
Information Governance Manager
The Rotherham NHS Foundation Trust
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