I was invited to attended this anniversary event on Saturday.
It was lovely and peaceful and elegant way to pay tribute to all the community and campaigners who have been involved in the campaign over the years.
There was talks and beautiful music provided by youngsters from the local area.
None of us could believe it’s been 20yrs… since the Vale hospital was as under threat from closure.
We may have saved it for now, but there’s always that threat due to under funding and under staffing.
When I got involved it was when I moved back to the area and couldn’t believe we had no Accident and Emergency, our clinics were disappearing. People were having to make a 40 mile round trip to get emergency medical care and attend essential clinics.
People had to fork out the cost of this themselves. Back then it was £20 for a taxi one way!
A lot of people were putting off receiving medical care, as they were frightened of being discharged during the night and unable to afford the taxi fare home.
Or they just couldn’t afford to go to their clinics.
Now 20yrs on….
We have a lot of the clinics back at the Vale hospital.
There’s a public bus service that shuttles back and forth.
There’s now an Assessment Unit.
However, the hospital still needs the Accident and Emergency unit back.
As we live in an area which isn’t geographically
great.
We have one main road A82, which becomes gridlocked quite a lot or closed due to repairs and accidents.
We have a bridge, which can be closed too bad weather, accidents or repairs, then further along we have a tunnel, which has they same issues as the bridge.
These have all proven to be very critical when transportation of patients to our now nearest A and E Dept. As we all know, time is critical…
I am hoping the community keep on campaigning, as the Vale of Leven Hospital is critical to our community for our healthcare and well being.
I’ll finish off with a wee fact about the Vale Hospital.
It was the first NHS hospital to be built in the UK.
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