Oxford hospitals suffer major blow

Oxford’s health chiefs had been expecting to launch a new era in local health care by becoming one of Britain’s first academic health science centres.

But Health Secretary Alan Johnson delivered a heavy blow to local hospitals and university research by announcing that Oxford will not be one of the initial five “world-class” new centres that are certain to attract massive extra funding for medical research.

Oxford had been heavily tipped to become one of the pioneering centres, holding out the promise of improvements in the quality of treatments and an influx of top doctors from across the globe.

But it was Cambridge, not Oxford, that made it on to the list of successful applicants. The other successful bids came from Manchester and three from London, where bids were led by Imperial College, King’s College and University College.

There is confusion over when Oxford can apply again for academic health science centre status.

The Oxford bid was submitted by an alliance of health professionals and academics from the university, Oxford Radcliffe Hospitals NHS Trust and the Nuffield Orthopaedic Centre, with Oxford Brookes University and Oxfordshire Primary Care Trust also involved.

A joint statement from the university, the NOC and the ORH Trust said: “It is disappointing for our patients and for the whole of the Oxfordshire community that we have not been designated as an academic health science centre at this time.

“Our organisations will continue to work closely in partnership, and with our academic and NHS colleagues in the wider healthcare system, to bring together our excellence in clinical services, teaching and research.”

The panel of international experts appointed by the Government to make the decision also rejected a bid from Birmingham University and five trusts. The Oxford academic centre would have incorporated the John Radcliffe and Churchill hospitals, Banbury’s Horton Hospital, along with the NOC.

The chief executive of Oxford Radcliffe Hospitals NHS Trust, Trevor Campbell Davis, said he was encouraged that Oxford had been invited to apply again.

He said: “The partners involved will be discussing this in the near future. While it is disappointing for the ORH that our proposals were not accepted by the Department of Health in their current form, we are encouraged by the feedback we received, which will help us to amend and improve our future proposals.

“The international panel which assessed our application complimented the partners on the outstanding science and biomedical research carried out in Oxford, and commented on the excellent potential foundations for an Oxford AHSC.”

But the panel urged further thinking on management arrangements and for Oxford to present evidence of research that makes a difference in primary care.

The exclusive new five-year status, designed to speed up the process of taking research breakthroughs into NHS patient care, would have boosted the city's ability to compete on the world stage for talent and funding.

A Department of Health Spokesman said: “The NHS-university partnership in Oxford is a world-leading centre of biomedical research, but was not able to demonstrate to the international panel that it met the wider range of criteria necessary for designation as an academic health science centre.”

The idea of academic health science centres was inspired by the partnership between universities and hospitals that are common in the United States, where the top 15 hospitals are all academic centres.

But the Oxford situation was undoubtedly complicated by the fact that the ORH Trust was still in the process of bidding to become a foundation trust when the Government unveiled its ‘super trust’ initiative.

It would have brought about one of the biggest local health reorganisations for years and formalised the university’s complex relationship with local hospitals.

The bid undoubtedly eased the pressure on the NOC, whose future as an independent trust was hanging in the balance last year.

The South Central Strategic Health Authority had earlier invited other NHS trusts and private health companies to bid for services of the world famous Headington Hospital. But the plans were suspended in the light of the academic health science centre bid.

The chief executive of the NOC, Jan Fowler, said yesterday: “We are now carefully considering the next steps with our partner organisations. However, the strategy of the board of the Nuffield Orthopaedic Centre remains what it has always been — to secure the future development of our specialist orthopaedic surgery, neuro-rehabilitation, and the treatment of musculoskeletal disease in a centre of excellence.”