A new start for Brighton hospital trust with merger close to sign-off

A new hospital trust for Brighton looks likely to be created within weeks as NHS chiefs prepare to sign-off a £1 billion merger.

The new organisation would be called University Hospitals Sussex and would run the Royal Sussex County Hospital, the Royal Alexandra Children’s Hospital and the Sussex Eye Hospital, in Brighton.

It would also run the Princess Royal Hospital, in Haywards Heath, Southlands Hospital, in Shoreham, Worthing General Hospital and St Richard’s Hospital, in Chichester.

Dame Marianne Griffiths, who already runs all seven hospitals, said: “The biggest global health crisis in a century has taught us many lessons this year.

“But for health services none has been more important than the value of working together to keep patients safe and achieve the very best outcomes we possibly can.

“In Sussex, our collaborative approach had already delivered many benefits by the time covid-19 engulfed us all but it was the onset of the pandemic that strengthened our resolve to explore a merger.

“Our joint response to the first wave demonstrated the improved benefits and resilience of acting as one, as well as the limitations of maintaining separation.”

The new organisation would be created from the merger of Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals NHS Trust – known as BSUH – and Western Sussex Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust.

Both trusts currently have the same senior leadership – and Western has run BSUH under a management contract since April 2017. The deal expires at the end of the month.

On Thursday (18 March) the two trusts’ boards are expected to make a formal request to merge.

If, as expected, they do so, the merger is expected to take effect on Thursday 1 April, with the creation of University Hospitals Sussex NHS Foundation Trust (UHSussex).

NHS England and NHS Improvement (NHSEI), which has evaluated the as yet unpublished business case for the merger, said that the strategic reasons for the proposed merger were “clear” and “strongly supported”.

The supportive comments came in a letter to Dame Marianne, who has won plaudits for her leadership of both trusts.

In the past four years she has guided BSUH out of “special measures” after an “inadequate” verdict from the Care Quality Commission (CQC), the official health and care watchdog.

The trust is now rated good overall and outstanding for caring while maintaining the outstanding rating awarded to Western.

It became the first non-specialist acute hospital trust to achieve outstanding ratings in all key inspection areas.

Dame Marianne said: “In July 2020, when we formally took the decision to explore a merger, we opened the door to a future in which we can continue to deliver consistently excellent care for patients as well as provide fulfilling careers for our staff in a new organisation that would truly be better for everyone.”

University Hospitals Sussex would employ nearly 20,000 people across five main hospital sites in Sussex, with an operating budget of more than £1 billion.

Chief medical officer George Findlay said: “We have made many improvements in recent years but it is getting harder to continue to improve our services in isolation.

“By working together, we can benefit from both greater scale and more opportunities to learn from each other and to do things differently.

“For example, we are developing an exciting five-year clinical strategy to explore where we can make the best improvements for our patients and develop new services that ensure fewer people in Sussex have to travel elsewhere for high-quality hospital care.

“We are committed to developing our vibrant local hospitals and maintaining the services we know local people treasure, such as A&E and maternity care.

“By coming together as one trust, we will have the experience, expertise, funds and influence to safeguard and improve hospitals services in Sussex.”

As well as running seven hospitals, the new trust would run a number of “community and satellite services”.

The trust would be responsible for all district general acute services for Brighton and Hove, West and Mid Sussex and parts of East Sussex.

It would also provide specialised and tertiary services across Sussex and parts of the south east, including neuroscience, arterial vascular surgery, neonatology, specialised paediatric, cardiac, cancer, renal, infectious diseases and HIV medicine services.

Dr Findlay added: “We wish to reassure our patients that we are taking a careful and considered approach and there will be no immediate changes to any of our clinical services as a result of the merger.

“The driving force behind our plans is our ambition to continually improve the care we provide and we look forward to involving our patients and the communities we serve in future developments.”

The merger is understood to have the support of the Health Secretary Matt Hancock.