Concerns raised over Lincolnshire NHS merger plans affecting hospital and community services

Questions have been raised over plans to create a new single NHS trust responsible for hospital and community healthcare across Lincolnshire.

Lincolnshire Community Health Services NHS Trust and United Lincolnshire Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust announced in August that they intend to formally merge.

The organisations already operate together as the Lincolnshire Community and Hospitals NHS Group but currently remain separate statutory trusts.

The proposed merger would bring them together legally as a single organisation.

It is a significant change for patients across the Lincolnshire coast because the organisations provide services ranging from Skegness Hospital and community healthcare to major acute hospital services at Boston, Lincoln and Grantham.

The NHS group says the merger would reduce duplicated administration, allow more joined-up digital systems and make it easier for patients to move between hospital and community-based care.

However, members of Lincolnshire County Council's Health Scrutiny Committee raised a number of questions when the plans were discussed on September 2.

Issues raised during the meeting included whether an increased shift towards providing treatment in people's homes and communities would be adequately monitored, whether existing recruitment challenges could be addressed and whether staff moving between acute hospital and community settings would receive sufficient training.

Councillors also sought reassurance that the proposed merger was being driven by improvements in patient care rather than simply by a desire to reduce costs.

Particular questions were raised about how individual communities and hospital sites would benefit and how accountability would be maintained for rural and coastal areas.

The committee agreed to establish a working group to prepare a response to the planned public engagement exercise.

The two trusts have already shared a board and executive leadership team since April 2024.

NHS leaders say that arrangement has helped reduce waiting lists, increase the number of patients treated through virtual wards and improve coordination between hospital and community services.

More than 330,000 diagnostic tests have also been delivered through the group's community diagnostic centres since the organisations began working together, according to the NHS.

Lincolnshire Community and Hospitals NHS Group chief executive Professor Karen Dunderdale has described the proposed merger as an opportunity to create services built more closely around patients' needs.

The group's longer-term ambition is for more patients to receive treatment in their homes and local communities by 2030 rather than relying solely on hospital-based care.

For Skegness residents, any future changes will be particularly relevant to community services and Skegness Hospital, which is currently operated by Lincolnshire Community Health Services NHS Trust.

The trust introduced its Call for Concern service at Skegness Hospital earlier this year as part of its wider community-hospital provision.

The proposed merger has not yet been completed. Further business-case work and public engagement are expected before any new single trust is formally created.