A CAMPAIGN to reopen two closed wards at Wharfedale Hospital has moved a step closer to its goal after a meeting between politicians and health chiefs this week.

Councillors Sandy Lay and Kate Whelan, together with Greg Mulholland MP, met with Phil Corrigan, chief executive of Leeds West NHS Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG), to discuss the next steps and potential timescales in bringing back into use the wards to accommodate 40 intermediate care beds.

The meeting follows a review by Leeds West CCG’s, which recommends opening a 40-bed facility in the two wards, which will be supervised by a geriatrician. It is now up to Leeds South and East CCG, who are now responsible for this decision, to implement it.

The beds would allow those who have been in an acute hospital, or need care they can’t receive at home, to stay in Otley, rather than having to go into Leeds.

The Support Wharfedale Hospital Campaign has long opposed both wards being closed by the Leeds Teaching Hospitals Trust – one in 2007 and the other in 2011.

The politicians are now seeking a meeting with Leeds South and East CCG to confirm details of when the wards could be reopened.

Cllr Lay (Otley and Yeadon ward), a former senior nurse at Wharfedale Hospital, said: “Our long campaign to get the wards reopened really does look like happening, and we hope it will, though we're not quite there yet.

"Working with Greg, Kate, Otley Town Council and the Support Wharfedale Hospital campaign, we will keep pushing until we are."

Otley town councillor Kate Whelan (West Chevin ward) added: “I am overjoyed at the prospect of having inpatient facilities in Otley again.

"As a local GP in the town in the '80s and '90s, I enjoyed the excellent facilities Wharfedale General Hospital offered to my patients. I was appalled when all the beds of the new, state-of-the-art and very costly hospital, were closed.

"It is unbelievable, given this sorry state of affairs, there are no direct buses to drop visitors – often frail and elderly themselves – in front of either hospital! The last three months of my own mother's life were made hell by five admissions from Guiseley, to five different wards, where she was faced with strange and inadequate staff, and was investigated anew every time, as nobody seemed to know anything about her.

“I stood for Otley Town Council in May primarily to fight for the reopening of both wards at Wharfedale Hospital. A lot of groundwork had already been down, over many years, by Cllr Lay, who was in charge of the last ward before it closed, and by our MP. I will do what I can to speed up the process. I have already spoken to some of the GPs in the town and many of the residents, and I have not met anyone who does not want a ward reopened!

“I very much hope these beds will be ready by the beginning of winter, as last winter virtually all planned admissions to the two Leeds hospitals had to be cancelled to accommodate the not unexpected, but unplanned for, seasonal surge in the number of acute patients. All in all, a great many people are suffering and this could be eased by taking this important step."