HEALTH chiefs have warned they could be forced into “emergency closure” of Bronglais Hospital’s paediatric services if staffing issues are not addressed.

A task and finish group into paediatric services across the Hywel Dda area has found that concern over staffing levels could see services in both Bronglais and Withybush temporarily close in future because of a lack of staff.

While the report from the group said the health board had managed to avoid closures so far, there was no guarantee that would continue to happen.

It says there is “increasing consideration of potential emergency closures of the Bronglais acute paediatric service overnight/weekends as a consequence of potential contingency plans in the absence of identified cover for the senior clinical fellow rota”.

The report, that went before the July meeting of the health board, adds: “Whilst the directorate has successfully avoided temporary emergency closures of the services at Withybush/Bronglais during this period, the risk of temporary emergency closure due to medical staffing challenges remains high.

“Efforts to identify locum cover continue on a daily basis and ‘last-minute’ solutions for uncovered shifts in the immediate/short term depend on agreement/availability from consultant/staff grade and associate specialist staff to ‘act down’ and cover rota gaps on a resident basis... This has significant workload implications for the staff involved and high-cost implications.

“The directorate continues to work closely with the Workforce and Organisational Directorate team in attempting to resolve the paediatric recruitment and retention challenges.”

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