Montfield unit to close

NHS SHETLAND formally agreed to close the interim placement unit (IPU) and associated day hospital at Montfield Hospital on Thursday.

The first floor unit in the Lerwick hospital has been out of action for more than a year while the NHS and Shetland Islands Council have worked closely together to support more old folk living at home.

A lengthy consultation on the closure yielded few responses from the public, though concern was raised about how the authorities would cope given the ageing profile of the local community.

The health board has agreed to carry out a review of community care resources in the future, with a view to supporting people to live as independently as possible.

The IPU was created in 2005 to hold people while a bed space in the community was found, during a period of severe shortages.

Last year the ground floor of Montfield Hospital was converted into a council run care home designed to move people back into the community as quickly as possible.

Work will now go into deciding what to do with the first floor where the IPU was based. Almost all the staff have been redeployed.

Director of clinical services Simon Bokor Ingram said: “We have to get better and better at providing the care that people want, which is in their own community and in their own homes.”