This page will have the latest updates on how we plan to maximise the use of Goole and District Hospital.
Goole and District Hospital Position Statement October 2025
- Introduction
This is the second joint briefing from the Humber and North Yorkshire NHS Integrated Care Board (ICB) and NHS Humber Health Partnership (HHP), providing an update on the work being done to maximise the use of Goole and District Hospital (GDH) and health services in and around Goole. The first briefing, issued in March 2025, can be found here: Goole and District Hospital Position Statement – Humber and North Yorkshire Health and Care Partnership
As with all public sector organisations, it is very important that all our staff and services offer safe, high-quality care that is cost effective and meets the changing needs of our local communities. In terms of GDH, as we have stated previously, there are no plans to close the hospital and we are committed to developing sustainable services for the future that meet the healthcare needs of people living in and around Goole.
As promised, over the past few months a number of discussions, led by the ICB, have taken place with members of the public, staff, stakeholders and local provider organisations to consider future plans and opportunities for health and care services in Goole. We would like to thank everyone for taking the time to talk to us and share their views and experiences.
We are continuing to consider how best to maximise the use of GDH, how best to use the skills and expertise of our Goole-based staff and to understand how community-based services may be better delivered in the future, in line with the 10-year health plan which was published earlier this year.
- What we have learned
We would like to thank everyone who has helped us to consider a range of initial ideas for GDH and everyone who has engaged with us throughout this process so far, particularly the local people who spent their time talking to us about their views of the hospital and wider health services in the town.
During May and September we held open listening events, visited community groups, ran a youth workshop, and launched an online survey that reached almost 300 residents. Together, this has given us one of the most detailed pictures we’ve ever had of what matters to people in one of our local areas.
What we heard was clear:
- People value GDH hugely — for its staff, its accessibility, and the quality of care it provides.
- At the same time, many feel uncertain about its future and frustrated when services are moved further away.
- Travel, communication, and trust are major issues that affect daily experiences of care.
- People want to be listened to — and to see their feedback reflected in visible action.
The insight we’ve gathered will now be used to inform the ongoing programme of work to develop sustainable services for the future at GDH that meet the needs of people living in and around Goole. But equally importantly, it has reinforced that building trust means ongoing, honest conversations with the community. This is not the end of engagement — it’s the start of a clearer, more collaborative relationship between the NHS and local people.
The findings from the ICB led engagement programme can be found in their report here (need link) It is worth noting again that we have recognised that there is significant support from the local community for GDH and we understand how valued many of its services and its staff are to local residents.
HHP has updated the ICB on the work so far and a summary of this is set out in section 3 below. In addition, the ICB has established a multi-agency group to discuss health improvement in Goole with a range of NHS, local authority, voluntary and community representatives.
- What happens now and next
In terms of services within the hospital, our work to date has shown areas where we would like to develop more detailed plans:
- Complex neuro-rehabilitation
This service is currently located on Ward 4 of the hospital and helps people with complex rehabilitation needs get back to living as independently as they are able. These patients typically spend a few months in the hospital and come from anywhere within North Yorkshire and the Humber region, and sometimes from even further afield.
In the next one to three years we would like to expand the provision into the neighbouring ward of the hospital (ward 3) so we can treat and care for more patients. In the longer term (3 years+) we will be working with partners to explore a fully integrated rehabilitation service across the North Yorkshire and Humber region.
- Surgery
There are two operating theatres and a dedicated eye surgery suite in Goole and around 16 patients a day receive surgery for one of the three areas that are routinely offered:
- Eye surgery
- Conditions affecting the urinary tract, including the kidneys and bladder
- Bones and joints
Low complexity operations take place in the two theatres within the hospital and patients can come from anywhere across the Humber region to have their surgery in Goole. Patients from the Goole area (DN14 postcodes) account for less than a quarter (around 750 in 2023/24) of the patients having surgery at Goole and District Hospital. Nearly twice as many (1,500) patients travel from North Lincolnshire each year, with a smaller number (600) travelling from North East Lincolnshire.
If patients require any other kind of surgery, like heart or plastic surgery, dental, stomach, liver, breast or any other surgery, they go to another hospital in our region where the specialist staff providing those services are available to look after them. Patients may also need to travel further if they need surgery and have other health conditions like diabetes or heart disease. This is because these patients might need access to further interventions, like high dependency or intensive care, after their surgery which is not available at Goole.
In the next six months we will be looking to put some new and different work into the two theatres whilst other theatres across the Humber Health Partnership group have work done to them. This will allow us to test whether patients will travel to Goole for these procedures and enable to make sure our processes are as efficient as possible. In the longer term we are looking to get the national team which accredits surgical hubs to assess whether Goole meets the criteria to become a surgical hub.
- Ophthalmology
We are looking at ways to extend some of the eye services that are available at Goole. This could mean changing the layout and location of some of the clinic rooms to make it easier for patients to get their treatments and also getting some new equipment which we will need.
- Integrated care and neighbourhood health
Currently we have a medicine step-down facility on ward 3. This is used primarily for patients who have had their initial treatment at Scunthorpe General Hospital but are not quite well enough to go home or are waiting for extra care or support in their home to be put in place so they can return home. On average around six in ten of the patients in Ward 3 are people from the Goole area, most of the rest are from North Lincolnshire with a small number coming from further afield like Hull, Gainsborough or Grimsby. For many other services, patients from the Goole area travel to Scunthorpe General Hospital or other sites. We think there are better ways of supporting and treating people in Goole and the surrounding area which better meet their needs, especially more frail and elderly people and those who might need to have regular injections and those with respiratory (breathing) difficulties.
By the end of this year we are looking to develop what is called an OPAT service – so patients who need regular antibiotic treatments through an injection can have most, or all, of them as an outpatient rather than having to stay in hospital. We also want to look at whether there is a need for a bed for patients who are reaching the end of their life and how else we can help patients at this time. We’re also going to work with other partners like local GPs and CHCP, who run community services in Goole and the surrounding area as well as the UTC in the hospital, to see if we can work together on a different way of delivering care for people who need it for a short time – which could be located where they live and/or in the hospital. As part of this work we’ll be assessing how we could move ward 3 into ward 2, which is currently empty or another area within the hospital.
- Outpatients
More than 15,000 outpatient appointments take place every year for people living in DN14 postcodes. However, for every two face-to-face appointments that takes place at Goole three take place in other hospitals. This is because some patients from the Goole area need specialist treatment (like radiotherapy) or need to see specialist teams of staff who are only based in one hospital. Therefore, on average, there are around 62 journeys per day from Goole to other hospital sites around the Humber for face-to-face outpatient appointments.
We heard from many people their frustration that they had to travel for appointments which they thought they could have had in Goole. In many cases they were right – there is lots of evidence patients have been offered appointments at other hospitals, for a variety of reasons, which they could have had in Goole. This is because the systems and processes we have are not fit for purpose and are letting down patients and the teams who need to use them. HHP already had plans in place to change how it runs outpatient appointments and these plans include Goole. So, in the next six months we will be looking at completing these plans as well as making sure we communicate with local people and local GPs about the clinics we currently run. The latest information on this is available here (need link to top to toe on the website) In the longer term we are looking at how we offer more or different clinics in Goole, either in person or using technology with staff on hand to help patients who need it.
- Maternity
The hospital runs antenatal clinics, including scans, and postnatal clinics run by midwives from NLaG. Antenatal and postnatal community clinics also take place at a local children’s centre in Goole run by a different team of midwives who work for Hull University Teaching Hospitals, the other hospital trust in the Humber Health Partnership. There is a ‘home from home’ room in the hospital where women with lower risk pregnancies can choose to birth with the support of community midwives. Eight babies were born here during 2023/24. Less than 3 in 100 women from Goole use this facility, with most (168 in 2023/24) opting to go to Scunthorpe to give birth.
This work has not progressed as much as others due to other priorities within maternity services across HHP. However, our plan is to bring together the two teams which work in Goole to work in a more joined up way and to offer as many scans as possible locally. This work is complicated because of staffing issues across the service and the need to train our staff, particularly interested midwives, in doing scans which will take some time.
- Diagnostics
The taking of blood, x-ray, CT and MRI scanning will all continue on site as they do now. We are looking at whether we can use newer mobile scanners, which are larger with their own changing rooms. This would require some upgrades to the pad the units sit on as the newer ones are heavier as well as upgrades to the power sockets.
- Urgent Treatment Centre
There are no plans to change the Urgent Treatment Centre which is located in the hospital and run by CHCP. The ICB has started a piece of engagement work around making the current opening times of the UTC (7am-8pm, seven days a week) permanent and maintaining the current level of provision.
- Next steps
We will continue the work we have outlined above, engaging with staff, partners, the newly formed multi-agency group and local people as we do that. We need to prepare business cases for the different services, these will allow us to formalise decisions about any changes. We also need to produce and cost up a plan around possible changes to the building as well as secure the funding to do any work.
Any questions from the public can be directed to the ICB via [email protected] and we will endeavour to answer these in a timely manner. Any questions from staff should be directed to NHS Humber Health Partnership or your own line manager / employer in the first instance.
24 October 2025