NHS calls up M*A*S*H-style operating units to cut

[bongme]

Hi

March 10, Sunday 2002

HOSPITALS are preparing to use military-style mobile operating theatres to reduce waiting lists. The M*A*S*H-style units are set to go into service in hospital car parks amid new pressure to speed up operations, writes Nicholas Rufford.

The £2m mobile theatres were designed to treat battlefield casualties but have been adapted to function in car parks where they can be connected by walkways and deal with up to 12 patients a day.

The initiative has been attacked by government critics who say the National Health Service is resorting to desperate measures. Official figures released last week show hospital waiting lists have risen by 20,000 in a year, despite pledges by Tony Blair that the government would be judged on its ability to improve the NHS.

Papworth hospital, one of Britain's leading heart centres, is negotiating to lease the first M*A*S*H theatre from a manufacturer of military vehicles based in Cambridge. It can be set up in hours and connected to hospital supplies of oxygen, water and electricity.

"We think it an excellent idea and if we can save lives and cut waiting times all the better," said Stephen Bridge, Papworth's chief executive. "It will be a sixth theatre. Most patients will not notice the difference."

The theatre, assembled from freight-container-sized units, will be parked near five existing theatres. Hospital officials hope it will be used to treat 500 cardiac patients a year.

Five other NHS trusts are negotiating to be supplied with  mobile theatres from Marshall Specialist Vehicles, a Ministry of Defence contractor. They are known colloquially as M*A*S*H (mobile army surgical hospital) units after the American film and television series set during the Korean war.

They consist of several units bolted together to provide a range of facilities, including an anaesthetic room, patient recovery room and washroom for medical staff, alongside the basic operating theatre.

The units will help surgeons to cope with emergency cases while their existing theatres are used for routine operations. They will also provide extra capacity if NHS trusts recruit teams of surgeons from overseas to carry out "production line" surgery such as hip replacements and cataract operations.

Surgeons welcomed the move but criticised the lack of investment in hospital buildings. "There is a desperate need for operating facilities so this is a good thing, but it should not be seen as anything more than a short-term fix," said Charles Collins, a council member of the Royal College of Surgeons.

Bongme

[Arnold Layne]

In MY experience, the NHS is a broken service. It is dangerously overstretched, disastrously mis-managed, underfunded by the morons at Westminster and a definite danger to those who depend upon it.

Right now, I would be hard put to to let even a dog be placed in NHS hospital care.

So maybe this idea is an improvement??