St Michael’s Hospital in Linlithgow faces long term closure as a community hospital almost a year after being temporarily shut during the Covid pandemic.
A report to West Lothian’s Integrated Joint Board yesterday, which oversees council and NHS health care provision in the county, agreed to proposals for public consultation ahead of plans for a wider reconstruction of long-stay hospital care.
Greater emphasis is being placed on care in the home, and a move away from long stay geriatric wards such as at St Michael’s and Baillie ward at Tippethill Hospital for what is known as Hospital Based Complex Continuing Care (HBCCC).