Make more use of remote services

Dear Sir, - I note the increased interest in the funding of the NHS with increased demand for local services colliding with the logistical benefi ts of centralising services.

One possible way around this quandary is to make more use of remote specialised services or tele-care.

If these were provided for hospitals such as Congleton Memorial and even district general hospitals such as Macclesfi eld and Leighton, patients and relatives could continue to benefi t from a local service while reducing the costs of running them.

Admittedly, you cannot conduct a physical examination remotely and yet much can be done that might allow standards to be maintained while reducing specialists travelling and so saving time and costs.

With good quality vision and sound, the patient satisfaction and quality of care might be suffi cient to allow this to happen with many conditions and symptoms.

Of course, this might mean that some investigations would be necessary that would not be in a face-to-face consultation.

I do feel that with modern technology, more resources could be invested into this sort of care to help balance this otherwise almost impossible dilemma. - Yours faithfully,

(DR) PETER HIRST

Middlewich.