Coronavirus: Non-urgent surgeries and chemo appointments on hold at Queen’s and King George hospitals
BHRUT's coronavirus pod outside Queen's Hospital in Rom Valley Way, Romford. Picture: Adriana Elgueta - Credit: Adriana Elgueta
Starting today Queen’s and King George hospitals are postponing all routine, planned surgeries and stopping all outpatient appointments including chemotherapy as the trust has seen an increase in seriously ill patients with Covid-19.
The changes were announced today by Barking, Havering and Redbridge University Hospitals NHS Trust (BHRUT) as a means to keep patients safe while it is dealing with an influx of coronavirus cases.
The trust is also stopping all outpatient appointments including chemotherapy and endoscopies and this includes both face-to-face and telephone appointments.
These changes will remain in place for at least the next two weeks and during this time, only the most urgent operations will be carried out.
The trust is setting up “hot clinics” for patients who need to urgently speak to a doctor on the phone, or require immediate treatment.
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Details of the hot clinics have not been provided yet.
A spokeswoman for BHRUT said it was making these changes to help keep patients safe as the hospitals are dealing with an increase in the number of seriously ill patients with coronavirus and it expects these numbers to increase in the days and weeks ahead.
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The decision to postpone chemotherapy was done to help protect cancer patients as the drugs they take affect their immune system, making them more suspectible to contracting Covid-19.
The trust said cancer patients are being reviewed to ensure no harm will come to them by delaying their treatment.
