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BBC News
9 hours ago
- Health
- BBC News
Ludlow parents' baffled by long trips for hospital checks
Working families in a rural town say they are having to clock up more than 60 miles in round trips every time their children have hospital have Ludlow Community Hospital on their doorsteps but said they were instead sent to Shrewsbury or Telford for short visits, including to eye clinics and for hearing tests. Many told me they have to drive from the town, in the south Shropshire countryside because the alternative involves using a train and then having to take a bus or a taxi. Health bosses said they have invested in children's services in recent months and wanted to work with the community to do more - but families we spoke to said they did not feel hopeful. Standing on her doorstep with her two-year-old, son, Rory in her arms, Stacey Harris pointed downhill, explaining: "Ludlow Community Hospital is a five minute walk over the top of those rooftops and we still have to travel 30 miles to Telford or Shrewsbury to get basic health care."Rory needs hearing tests and speech and language therapy but getting to the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital and Telford's Princess Royal is not straightforward. "We've only got one car so my husband has to take time off it means it's a whole day. I have to get my mum to collect my other children from school," she added."Trains and buses are too time consuming and too expensive." As a Ludlow town councillor representing many working families, Harris said others were also travelling long distances for short appointments."I've had people come to me from all over Ludlow saying they have to go for regular check ups and tests and eye sight tests and things like that and they always have to go to Shrewsbury or Telford," she said. Another mum, Kay, said she changed jobs to work more flexibly because taking her 12-year-old daughter Matilda and 10-year-old son Milo to eye clinics in Shrewsbury became so time consuming. "They have to go every six months, both of them do. And the appointments only last 20 minutes, if that really," she said."But it takes such a long time to get there, it's an hour to get there and you have to allow for parking and it's an hour to come back. It's such a big chunk of the day and they're missing time off school."Matilda is frustrated too: "Well of course not everybody likes school but it always feels like sometimes I'm missing important things when I'm not at school."Like I missed a test once and I had to do that on one of the days when it was a 'fun day'."Milo added: "It annoys me because I could just go to Ludlow." Hospital frustrations Shropshire, Telford and Wrekin Integrated Care System declined our request for an interview but a spokesperson said they were committed to building on its community offer, in line with the government's 10-year NHS plan to move more services from hospitals closer to people's said they have worked to deliver more services including the development of the Ludlow and Community Family Hub."Shropshire Community Health NHS Trust continues to provide services in people's homes, schools and clinics," they added. The spokesperson said the children's audiology services was expected to return from Telford to Shrewsbury "once construction work associated with the hospitals transformation programme is complete".But the families we spoke to said the distance from Ludlow to Shrewsbury was almost the same as that to Telford, so the move would not help did they feel hopeful about getting other appointments closer to home."They tell us lots of lovely things but they never seem to deliver quite on that which is really frustrating for us when we've got our little hospital that we're all fighting to keep," Harris sighed. Follow BBC Shropshire on BBC Sounds, Facebook, X and Instagram.
BBC News
5 days ago
- Health
- BBC News
One in 10 pregnant women in Guernsey smoking at time of delivery
More than 10% of pregnant women in Guernsey said they were smoking at the time of delivery, new data says. Guernsey's Quitline and Public Health said last year, when 10.4% admitted smoking while pregnant, engagement with the smoking cessation service was "low, with women frequently declining appointments or not attending accepted appointments".The services added that further work was under way "to explore how we can improve the engagement of expectant women with services to help them quit smoking".Meanwhile, the UK reported a record low of 6.1% in the same year. The bailiwick levels were also up by 2.7% from the year bosses said pregnant women who were identified as smoking at the time of booking a maternity appointment or subsequent antenatal appointments were referred to the Quitline service on an opt-out appointments are then offered weekly for at least 12 weeks."The Quitline nurses understand that stopping smoking can feel daunting. However, it is absolutely achievable... with the friendly professional support and, where appropriate, free Nicotine Replacement Therapy (NRT)," the service is also the option to Health warned: "Smoking during pregnancy is harmful to both the mother and baby, and remains a significant risk factor for serious health complications."The risks of smoking in pregnancy include a greater risk of miscarriage, pre-term delivery, a low birthweight baby, stillbirth or sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS)".
