Louie French has welcomed the new £9 million cutting edge scanners at Queen Elizabeth Hospital which will improve waiting times, provide a greater range of tests, as well as speedier diagnosis and treatment which is crucial for improved health outcomes.
The three new scanners include a state-of-the-art MRI scanner and a new CT scanner within a new specialist unit at Queen Elizabeth Hospital, as well as a new CT scanner at University Hospital Lewisham.
Local patients are already seeing the benefits of these new scanners including 100% of outpatients being scanned within 6 weeks of referral and within seven days for patients on the cancer pathway including offering patients their scans of the same day as their cancer appointment.
Louie welcomes the significant investment our local hospitals have received in recent years including this multi-million pound project and other capital investment to Lewisham and Greenwich NHS Trust including:
- Over £30 million infrastructure project at Queen Elizabeth Hospital for up-to-date electrics, better quality air and more resilient oxygen supply
- £14 million for a new elective hub with two day case theatres at University Hospital Lewisham to perform procedures in areas like Urology and Ear, Nose and Throat
- Over £13 million investment into a new community diagnostic centre at Eltham Community Hospital: will provide 64,000 additional scans and 27,000 extra blood tests a year and improve diagnosis and waiting times for all local residents
This is in addition to the multi-million pound investments in our local hospital at Queen Mary’s Hospital, Sidcup which Louie has closely supported, including 2 new operating theatres, new digital scanners, new oral and maxillofacial department, new Cancer Centre and Kidney Treatment Centre.
However, Louie is aware of the concerns local residents have surrounding waiting times at the A&E Department and elective care at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital. Louie met the Hospital Trust’s Chief Executive during the visit to discuss the hospital’s improvement plans to overcome these challenges and deliver urgent improvements which Louie will continue to monitor closely.
More widely, Louie closely monitors the Prime Minister’s priority of cutting waiting lists and welcomes that new figures show there are a record number of doctors and nurses with the Government delivering on their commitment to recruit 26,000 more primary care staff by 2024 with 5,369 more doctors, 11,883 more nurses and health visitors, 258 more midwives, and 517 more ambulance staff working in our NHS compared to last year.
Commenting, Louie said:
“I am hugely passionate about constituents receiving better healthcare closer to home and therefore welcome these new scanners at Queen Elizabeth Hospital which are reducing waiting times and providing speedier diagnosis and treatment for conditions like cancer which is crucial to improving health outcomes.”
“This new investment complements the new facilities we have opened at our local Queen Mary’s Hospital recently to deliver improvements to access to high quality health care locally and I will continue to campaign for further investment and facilities at our local hospital.”
“I also welcomed the opportunity the visit provided to raise concerns over waiting times for the hospital’s A&E Department and to hear about the Trust’s plans to improve this which I will continue to monitor closely. This includes an increase in the number of beds on site later this year”
