20th AprilFAREWELL TO POLTAIR HOSPITALIn the month that Poltair Hospital has finally closed its doors, been emptied of its resources and put up for sale, West Cornwall HealthWatch feels it important to mark the passing of this much loved and deeply lamented hospital. We, as so many others in our community, are saddened to see it go. This hospital has played such an important role and could, we believe, have continued to do so in the NHS of the future, as a facility for integrated community services.The loss of the inpatient beds has left us with no local community ‘step-up, step-down’ beds, and has undoubtedly contributed to the problems of ‘bed-blocking’ at Treliske. We note that Poltair's staff base and outpatient services are to be delivered in four different locations across Penzance – Bellair Clinic, the Old Courthouse, the Leisure Centre, and Mounts Bay surgery at Sainsburys (nowhere suitable could be found for the Chronic Fatigue Clinic which will be delivered on a home basis). It seems to us that scattering these services fragments rather than integrates community provision. We will be monitoring the impact of these changes. We fear that eventually we will rue the day that the decision was taken to close Poltair Hospital - the complete opposite to the outcome of the public ‘consultation’.All we can do at this moment is salute and thank the generations of NHS staff who have served their patients at Poltair, and be grateful for the care received by so many of our families and friends there over the years. We yet hope that one day we will have a new community hub offering a full range of services – inpatient beds, clinics, outpatients, with facilities for support groups and others to meet - which will meet the needs of the people of West Penwith.