Health

Cancer patients, their friends, family and carers in Holbeach will now be able to get information, advice and support closer to home. A new outreach session will enable people living in and around the area to access regular information and support about cancer, and caring for someone with cancer. Starting this month, trained staff from the Macmillan Cancer Information and ...

There will be no new NHS dental surgeries opening this month in Spalding. The news has come as a blow to South Holland residents with no access to regular health service dentists. Those already operating in the town don’t want to take on more patients, despite the possibility of funding. JDSP Dental Ltd was poised to move into Winsover Road ...

Groups are coming together in a bid to improve the lives of people in Crowland affected by dementia. Setting up a regular cafe for those with the condition and their carers is one idea being looked at by charity Tonic Health, Crowland Cares and Abbeyview Surgery. The organisations are looking at the possibility of setting up a dementia day service ...

New surveys have been launched to gauge public opinion on two essential services: GP practices and Lincolnshire Police. NHS England has created a survey asking more than two million people to give their opinions on their local GP surgery. The results are published online at the website https://www.gp-patient.co.uk Here, you can search for your surgery to see how it has ...

The number of “excess deaths” in the county caused by cold was last winter the highest since 1975. As temperatures start to fall, concerns have been raised over the welfare of vulnerable households across the county following a new government report which reveals there were 700 excess winter deaths in Lincolnshire during 2016/17*, partly caused by people living in cold ...

An inquest has heard of continued steps by Lincolnshire Police towards better communications with East Midlands Ambulance Service after the two emergency services took almost 90 minutes to attend the scene of a man who had attempted to take his own life. By the time crews arrived at Paul Woodham’s home in Meadow Walk, Cowbit, he had died. The hearing ...

Parking at three Lincolnshire hospitals will be free while problems with the new system are ironed out. United Lincolnshire Hospitals NHS Trust (ULHT) has announced that it will be providing free car parking for patients and visitors following problems with its new parking system. The Trust plans to reintroduce charges on Monday, January 7. For the last month, the Trust ...

Spalding’s Johnson Hospital should be upgraded to a ‘super urgent treatment centre’, says a letter from MP Sir John Hayes. Following news that the hospital may become a GP hub instead of a minor injuries unit, Sir John sought reassurance that this would not happen from the chief operating officer of South Lincs CCG Andrew Rix, who told him the ...

Patients in Lincolnshire do not have “equality of access” to some services, according to a county Healthwatch report due for discussion on Thursday. Members of South Lincolnshire Care Commissioning Group (CCG) will be told that problems with adult neurology; autism and dyspraxia services along with other childhood neurodevelopmental disorders services could escalate. “Our concern has been recognised by the number ...

Parking prices for patients and visitors at United Lincolnshire Hospitals Trust are to go up on Monday. The trust is joining forces with ParkingEye to introduce numberplate recognition system at all of its car parks. Patients will then pay at the end of their stay at one of the kiosks using their registration number. Payment can be with cash, card ...

Accident and emergency waiting time figures for the United Lincolnshire Hospitals Trust are the worst in the country. Figures released earlier this week show that the trust achieved just 67.2 per cent in the maximum four hour wait target for A&E. This put it at the bottom of the pile of 130 trusts with an A&E department and it hasn’t ...

The Johnson Community Hospital in Spalding will no longer deal with walk-in minor injuries if a major review of emergency care in Lincolnshire is approved. The hospital, which operates as a non-appointment unit for minor injuries in the South Holland area, is in the firing line to be re-categoried. If the proposed reforms are approved, it will only be open ...

A Cowbit petrolhead, who has spent the last year raising awareness of his deliberating condition, is facing an emotional end of the motor-racing season as it could be the last he’s able to travel to independently. James Wilson-White (50) has Complex Regional Pain Syndrome (CRPS), a nerve issues that causes pain and affects movement, which is spreading throughout his body ...

Around 50 people a year in the South Holland and the Deepings region are diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, according to Cancer Alliance, and one in four people diagnosed with the disease won’t survive a month. Today (Thursday) is Pancreatic Cancer Day, an event created to bring awareness to the quickest killing form of cancer. Pancreatic Cancer UK specialist nurse, Diana ...

Ambulance staff will not be sent to those who have suffered non emergency falls in Lincolnshire in a new pilot project that is aiming to cut waiting times. A new “model of response” to deal with falls has been announced and Lincolnshire County Council, which has pledged £300,000 to help fund it, hopes it will be up and running before ...

The organisation which looks after Peterborough’s hospital has been rated as ‘requires improvement’. North West Anglia NHS Foundation Trust provides hospital-based services for patients. It covers three main hospitals: HInchingbrooke, Peterborough and Stamford and Rutland Hospital. The Care Quality Commission inspected the trust and published its report last week. The inspection took place in July and looked at nine core ...

Waiting times in Lincolnshire for smear test results are still “unacceptable” but are improving, the NHS has said after being questioned by a county health group. In August The Voice reported that women were facing up to 12 week delays on getting their results for cervical screening tests. It’s because the Derby-based laboratory which examines tests taken within South Holland ...

Local MP John Hayes has backed an appeal from Cancer Research UK for more NHS staff to deliver life-saving cancer tests and treatments.  The South Holland and The Deepings MP met with campaigners recently to hear about the “Shoulder to Shoulder Against Cancer” campaign. It calls for the UK Government to tackle what it says is a chronic shortage of ...

A Weston family has raised thousands of pounds for two hospitals to say thank-you for saving their five-year-old daughter’s life. Jessica Blow has recently been given the all clear from bone marrow cancer. Doctors had initially dismissed the then three-year-old’s swollen stomach and pain as constipation when she first became ill in May 2016. It took Jessica being admitted to ...

Holbeach Hospital has been inviting young people to come in and play with some of their more elderly residents. The Inter-Generation Sessions are the brainchild of activities coordinators Maggie Ward and Jackie White. Young people are being invited to take part in activities and talk to the older people. Jackie White: It’s something I’ve been interested in for ages. In ...