COLUMN: Health Matters

When I joined the campaign group back in April 2024 it was to primarily understand what progress was being made in planning more Health Provision for the town after seeing significant new housing developments and attending the "Often Heated" Cedars School Meeting the previous year where all the decision makers present acknowledged there was a problem but seemed to lack any joined up strategy as to what they were going to do to improve the situation as "there was no money for the 30 outstanding projects" in Central Bedfordshire alone?

After 9 months campaigning, I now have a much greater appreciation of the challenges the staff at our local practices and Clinic must contend with every day and the large number of volunteers that support these services as Patient Participation Group members or as Volunteer Transport drivers offering a vital link to patients with appointments to 30+ locations with no direct bus service or at times outside the timetable.

This demonstrates Leighton Buzzard’s strength as a community – what we still lack is any "Road Map" to a better future – the recently announced Outline Business Case is planned solely around the current budget constraints, with no clear explanation about how these options will improve services by quantifying the reductions in appointments that require travel outside the town and for how long they will be fit for purpose until further population growth triggers an additional service review.

We are in ongoing discussions with the Health Board to obtain greater transparency about plans and prioritization of projects for when the anticipated extra money from the Darzi review starts to filter into Primary Care funding and we are still trying to encourage greater involvement from our MP on this issue.

The Leighton Linslade Health Provision Group are grateful for your support, we will be announcing the details of our 2025 Campaign next month but would welcome any suggestions or offers of support for next year’s campaign.

We can be contacted via email at [email protected] and if you are not already a member of our Facebook group we can be found at Leighton Linslade Health Matters.

We wish you all Health and Happiness in the new year ahead.