Please note that Covid restrictions and social distancing requirements contiue to be implemented within our hospitals. All imaging is currently being offered on an appointment only basis. For plain film x-rays patients are required to call the department to arrange an appointment. For all other modalities including CT, MRI, Ultrasound and Nuclear Medicine patients will either recieve a telephone call fom the department or will be sent an appointment letter in the post.
Patients are being booked in priority order, but if you would like to amend the priority of a referral for a patient please phone: 01284 713738 to speak to the duty Radiologist.
Staff and patient safety remains our priority, which means services will continue to have reduced capacity until further notice. We therefore ask you to consider all referrals that are made into the hospital and prioritise accordingly so that patient expectations are managed.
We are still asking patients to attend their appointments alone wherever possible so that we can reduce the number of people in the department and protect the safety of our staff, patients and visitors. Paediatric patients, wheelchair users and patients who require support from a carer are permitted to bring an additional person with them. It is recommended that children do not accompany adults to the hospital.
We are seeing an increase in the number of inpatient and ED referrals to all modalities and this is having an effect on outpatient waiting times. We contrinue to explore options to increase capacity across all imaging modalities.
GP’s can still refer patients for CT Head and CT KUB but as previously these need to be requested electronically and then discussed with the duty Radiologist on: 01284 713738
There are around 660 patients on the CT waiting list with outpatients waiting approximately 11-12 weeks.
We are continuing to work hard to reduce the backlog of patients waiting. There are around 620 patients on the MRI waiting list with outpatients waiting approximately 10-11 weeks.
If you have any patients with spinal red flags please call duty Radiologist on 01284 713738.
There are around 1,000 patients on the Non-Obstetric Ultrasound waiting list with patients waiting approximately 16-17 weeks.
Additional community sessions are also being delivered to provide further capacity. Please advise patients that if they are willing to travel then they may be able to be seen sooner.
To comply with social distancing the walk-in service at the West Suffolk Hospital has been changed to offer an appointment system only for both GP and Outpatient referrals.
The current locations and frequency of where plain film referrals are being appointed are as follows:
West Suffolk Hospital : Monday - Friday, 8am - 6pm- patients may be offered an appointment at Newmarket hospital to help reduce the volume of patients attending the main WSFT site. This is to support social distancing and allow us to protect our staff and patients as much as possible. Appointments will continue to be managed by the WSFT team who will advise patients accordingly.
Newmarket Community Hospital - Monday - Friday, 9am - 5pm
Thetford Healthy Living Centre - 6 sessions per week, over the course of 3 days
Sudbury Health Centre - 6 sessions per week over the course of 3 days
Botesdale Health Centre - 2 sessions per week (1 day)
When referring a patient for a plain film x-ray please complete the request using your normal method of referral.
Patients then need to call us to arrange an appointment:
- West Suffolk / Thetford / Sudbury 01284 713378
- Newmarket Hospital 01638 564065
Instant Access
The established intant access pathway is still available for patients with suspected fractures or acute illness. However, there must be an agreed patient treatment plan in place for this.
GP’s occasionally refer patients for a Bone Scan and currently there is no reduced capacity for this procedure. Therefore, please request using your usual method of referral.
Women are asked to attend appointments alone, unless it is an appointment for results.
We are now actively encouraging any self-referrals over 70 who have not had a screen in the last 3 years.
Patients will be sent an invite letter for screening when they are due to attend.
Ladies identified as having a learning difficulty will still be sent a timed appointment (GP’s to provide lists of identified LD women).
Currently due to the Covid situation women must wait outside the mobile until invited in, and not arrive early or late as we have a strict policy of only one woman allowed on the van at any time.