Feature

The end of an era?

The Elizabeth Garrett Anderson Hospital in London, the last NHS hospital guaranteeing women treatment in an all-women environment, has now introduced male consultants. But all is not yet lost…

Bloomsbury Health Authority’s decision to merge the Soho Hospital for Women and the Elizabeth Garrett Anderson Hospital (EGA) has caused deep concern to many women.

The EGA was founded in 1866 as a place where women could train and practise as doctors and where women patients could be guaranteed to be treated in an all-women environment. It is the last such hospital available to women on the NHS. Women from all over the country have sought treatment there and it is exempt from the Sex Discrimination Act. The closure of the nearby Soho Hospital and the transferral of six male consultants to the EGA means not only a 20 percent reduction in gynaecological services in the district, but also that male staff are now being appointed at all levels.

The EGA action committee, set up last year to fight these proposals, has built a base of support among patients and women locally and nationally to publicise the hospital and the campaign to keep women’s health in women’s hands.

On 3 January this year, the day the male consultants started work, the action committee organised a picket of the hospital and later took a 10,000 signature petition to 10 Downing Street.

Michaela O’Brien from the EGA action committee told healthmatters of her fears that this ‘vital resource’ will vanish, and with it women’s right to be treated by other women. ‘This is worrying not only for women who would prefer this but more especially for rape victims and women who, for religious or cultural reasons, want to be treated by women. It is a basic attack on women’s right to choose,’ she said.

Yet Judith Jones, unit general manager at the EGA, argues that the decision was taken after wide consultation and was supported by both the community health council and the EGA charity trust. According to Ms Jones male doctors have been employed at the EGA in the past, although not in gynaecology, and even under the present arrangements every woman will continue to be given the choice of seeing a woman doctor.

She believes that the merger was the best way to save the EGA and in fact extends women’s choice. ‘The merger links us with University College Hospital so we can offer more training, making it easier to attract women doctors, which has been a problem in the past.

’We are also implementing a positive equal opportunities policy, increasing the number of part-time jobs available, including training jobs, and guaranteeing that the next consultant appointment will be a woman.’ says Ms Jones.

Bloomsbury health authority is currently evaluating the situation; collecting statistics and asking staff and patients to fill in questionnaires. It will report its findings in June. ‘We are hoping that if this evaluation shows women are not satisfied, and want to return to an all-women environment, the health authority will honour that and reverse the decision. In the meantime we will go on fighting’, says Ms O’Brien.