PATIENTS are being moved across Colchester General Hospital at night as a ward is temporarily closed.

Wendy Dennant said she was among eight patients to be moved out of Stanway Ward one Friday, only to be moved back again on Monday morning.

Mrs Dennant, who was being treated on the gynaecology ward, said she and three other emergency patients were wheeled to an orthopeadics ward for the weekend. Four non-emergency patients were sent to a different ward.

Mrs Dennant, 53, of Oakley Road, Ramsey, said: “Each group had a gynae nurse with them.

“They had to take certain pieces of equipment, and the nurse looking after us had to keep tripping backwards and forwards for things because they weren’t kept on the ward we were on.

“Then, on Monday morning, we were all shunted back to Stanway Ward “It was an upheaval. Everything had to be packed up and slung on to the bed and we were wheeled across to the other ward.

“All my stuff was in bags and it wasn’t worth unpacking because I knew I would have to move back again.”

Mrs Dennant added: “I just don’t understand the logic. Most of the money they must have been saving must have been on cleaning and lighting, and can that really be worth it when you consider what the patients were put through?

“Luckily, by the time I was moved on the Friday, I was recovering.

“If I had been admitted later that week, I would have been slap bang in the middle of my treatment when I was moved.

“There is no way I could have coped with being shunted around like that.”

The chief executive of Colchester Hospital University NHS Foundation Trust said it was more efficient to close Stanway Ward at weekends.

Dr Gordon Coutts said the hospital had implemented the change because, in common with the national trend, there had been a fall in gynaecology patients being treated in wards.

More were being treated as out-patients, day-case patients, or in the community.

He said: “In addition, there has been a reduction in the amount of time in-patients spend in hospital after certain procedures.

“For example, as a general rule, patients are spending less time in hospital after hysterectomies and mastectomies than ever before.

“Therefore, there is not a need for a seven-day-a-week ward, and it made sense and was more efficient to close Stanway Ward at weekends.

“There are no plans to further reduce its opening hours from the current level.” Dr Coutts said Stanway Ward had been closed at weekends since mid-September.

He said the maximum number of patients transferred to other wards on a Friday evening was three, and last weekend there were two.

The latest a transfer took place was at 9pm, but they were usually done before this and after the patient had had their evening meal.

Dr Coutts added: “In the ideal world, no patients would be transferred from one ward to another after they have been admitted to a ward but, in reality, this happens in every acute hospital in the NHS.

“We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause, but the transfers are for only a short distance.”