If Torbay's pathology is this good, why move it?
The Trust has just certified that our pathology service is high quality and improving. It is also planning to move it to Exeter. A service cannot be worth celebrating and worth uprooting at the same time.
This week the Trust celebrated a national accreditation result for its pathology laboratories. We congratulate every member of staff who earned it. Behind that result are eight to nine months of audits and evidence gathering, and years of hard work by scientists and clinicians at Torbay Hospital. It is a genuine achievement, and it tells us something the Trust would rather we did not dwell on.
The United Kingdom Accreditation Service does not assess buildings. It assesses whether a laboratory meets national standards for quality, safety and competence. Those standards are being met at Torbay, now, by the people working there now. The Trust says Microbiology and Biochemistry were recognised for consistently high quality, that Microbiology drew particular praise, and that Cellular Pathology is reporting 94 per cent of cases within 10 days, ahead of the 90 per cent national standard.
A service that is this good is not a problem to be solved by moving it more than twenty miles away.
Read the Trust's own statement carefully and the relocation is written all through it. Staff are praised for "engaging constructively with potential change across pathology" and for delivering results "despite the challenges of working within ageing facilities and preparing for future changes". In other words, the quality sits with the people and the processes, which the Trust itself admits are performing above standard, while the case for moving rests on the age of a building.
"Colleagues have continued to deliver high-quality services for patients while also engaging constructively with potential change across pathology. They have done so while maintaining a relentless focus on quality and improvement. I am particularly pleased that the inspectors recognised the significant improvements made in Cellular Pathology. That achievement is a credit to colleagues who have worked incredibly hard to strengthen the service and improve performance, despite the challenges of working within ageing facilities and preparing for future changes."
Ria McCoy, Associate Director of Operations for Cancer and Clinical Support Services, and Programme Director for Pathology
There is a warning in the small print too. The Trust says assessors highlighted ongoing workforce challenges in Haematology and Blood Transfusion, affecting both clinical and biomedical scientist roles. A service that is already stretched for staff is exactly the service that a move to Exeter puts most at risk. Skilled scientists who can get to Torbay may not be able or willing to commute to Gadeon House. That is how a strong team is quietly weakened, one resignation at a time, and how an accredited service loses the very people who earned the accreditation.
We will keep asking the questions the Trust has so far avoided. If the laboratories at Torbay are good enough to pass a national inspection, the burden is on the Trust to explain why patients in our bay would be better served by sending that work to Exeter. So far, it has not.
Stand with us to keep pathology, cardiology and emergency services at Torbay Hospital.
Get involvedSource: Torbay and South Devon NHS Foundation Trust, "Pathology colleagues recognised following successful accreditation visit".