HEALTHWATCH Dorset has expressed fears NHS bosses are making decisions on a radical shake-up of health services without listening to the public.

It comes after the Daily Echo reported how Poole hospital chiefs are ready to accept key plans to make the Royal Bournemouth Hospital the area’s major A&E centre as a merger of the two hospital trusts is back on the table three years after the idea was scrapped.

Poole chief executive Debbie Fleming revealed in a letter to all 3,500 staff that the hospital must recognise ‘the majority view’ of their partners that RBH is the preferred option for the site despite both hospitals previously saying they were best equipped to take on emergency care.

Joyce Guest, the health watchdog, said: “Healthwatch Dorset would like to remind our local NHS that their most important ‘partners’ are their patients and the people of Dorset.”

She added people across the county have already expressed "serious concerns" over proposals to designate one hospital as a major emergency hub and the other for planned care with a 24-hour urgent care centre.

Dorset’s Clinical Commissioning Group, which is carrying out the clinical services review, has revealed Bournemouth is its preferred option.

However, around 50,000 people have signed petitions calling for Poole to keep its A&E trauma unit.

Patients’ concerns include access to RBH, travel times, the impact the proposals will have on other services at Poole Hospital and concerns about staffing, according to the health watchdog.

Joyce, added: “We are repeatedly told that ‘no decisions have been made’ and the proposals will be put to public consultation later in the year.

“But statements like the one reported will only add to the suspicion held by many that decisions have, in fact, already been made and that the public consultation will make no difference. If that isn’t true, then it’s up to our local NHS to prove it.”

As reported, national health chiefs have told Poole and RBH to look again at the possibility of a merger of the two trusts who say implementing the proposals of the Dorset Clinical Services Review would be “extremely difficult as two organisations.”

The trusts previously battled for two years to merge in a bid to save money.

However in October 2013, the merger was blocked by the Competition Commission who said it would “damage patients’ interests by eliminating competition and choice.”

At the time both trusts said they felt the merger was the best option to ensure “high-quality hospital services to local people” and were “deeply disappointed” by the decision.

A public consultation on the clinical services review will take place in the autumn.

Tracey Nutter, director of nursing and patient services, Poole Hospital NHS Foundation Trust said: “It’s important to remember that the clinical services review is a Dorset CCG-led initiative and hasn’t even got to public consultation stage yet. As such no decisions have been made and our preferred option still remains becoming the county’s major emergency hospital for reasons previously stated.

“The views of the public are an important aspect of the clinical services review, and we are confident that they will be fully taken into account by the CCG. However, we also have to be aware of the views of our partners and we are conscious that many in the health and social care sector support the CCG’s recommendation that Royal Bournemouth Hospital should take on this role. Therefore, it would be short sighted not to factor that into our current considerations.”