Consultants at Withybush Hospital have expressed their lack of confidence in Hywel Dda’s current consultation to chief executive Trevor Purt.

A letter from the Medical Staff Committee (MSC), seen by the Western Telegraph, sets out consultants’ concerns over “proposed service reconfigurations”.

It states that the MSC hope to have a more active participation in discussions and decision making process having been “largely excluded”

so far.

“Previous submissions from MSC and from senior management at Withybush have made similar points.

However, these documents received no mention in the summary from ORS, and the content is not recognisable in the consultation document.

“We therefore have no confidence in the current consultation process, and think it will result in worse services for the residents of Pembrokeshire (and Ceredigion),” adds the document.

The Withybush MSC supports a number of proposals in the consultation document including the continued provision on this site of emergency and acute care services, acute medicine, ITU/critical care, consultant- led obstetric services, in-patient paediatric services, and all necessary radiology and laboratory services.

However, it states that it believes the “weighting/ scoring exercise was not performed on a level playing field” and there are “doubts about the accuracy and relevance of many facts in the technical documents”.

An example given refers to the requirement of 40 hours a week consultant cover on the labour ward, stated as only achievable by centralising services at Glangwili, for which the MSC says cover has been provided at Withybush since 2006/07.

The MSC tell Mr Purt that the proximity of Swansea and Carmarthen make it “far more logical to upgrade services at Withybush or Bronglais,” adding that centralising all joint replacements would “not in itself create a ‘centre of excellence’”, a term it believes should be changed.