Today the fight to bring emergency heart services to Ipswich reaches critical levels after a damming report described a hospital Suffolk patients are being sent to as filthy and second rate.

IPSWICH: Today the fight to bring emergency heart services to Ipswich reaches critical levels after a damming report described a hospital Suffolk patients are being sent to as filthy and second rate.

Spot checks carried out by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) at Basildon University Hospital revealed a host of gruesome discoveries including blood spattered on curtains and chairs in the A&E department, poorly trained nursing staff, patients treated on trolleys and a catheter bag on the floor as well as unusually high mortality rates.

Since September three heart attack patients from Suffolk have been sent to the underperforming NHS trust and today there were calls for a stop to emergency heart attack treatment at Basildon.

Health campaigners battling for an equal right to access to emergency care are urging people to back The Evening Star's Have a Heart Appeal to establish a primary angioplasty (PPCI) centre here in Suffolk.

Prue Rush said the standards reported at Basildon Hospital are “totally unacceptable,” and called for it to be taken out of the PPCI equation altogether.

She said: “It will of course cause great unease for the families and the patients themselves who are going to be taken there for any kind of invasive surgery. People will rightly feel threatened by the poor hygiene standards.”

Despite the fact heart attack patients are likely to receive care away from the dirty A&E department Mrs Rush said it seemed ridiculous putting patients at risk in Basildon when there was a perfectly good hospital on their doorstep.

Len Tate, vice president of the east Suffolk branch of Heartbeat and chair of the Ipswich Hospital cardiology user group added: “The news about Basildon was a shock. I would worry myself if I was told I was on route to Basildon for treatment.

“I do a lot of hospital visits at Ipswich and the cardiology department is clean, the wards are well run and the staff are excellent.”

Despite the appalling conditions health bosses are standing by their decision to send patients from Suffolk to Basildon for emergency heart care.

In a joint statement NHS Suffolk and the strategic health authority NHS East of England said: “NHS East of England and NHS Suffolk are confident that cardiac services at Basildon & Thurrock hospitals are high quality.

“Cardiac services are provided in a new purpose built centre, separate from the main hospital.”

It has emerged that Ipswich Hospital was also subjected to spot checks by the CQC last week - and the trust has been given a clean bill of health.

Ipswich Hospital has been rated among the top 20 per cent of hospitals in the region for infection control, which encompasses cleanliness.

It is ranked seventh out of the 17 NHS trusts in the East of England categorised in band four of five. Basildon University Hospital ranked lowest in band one.

Hazel Byford, spokeswoman for Ipswich Hospital, said: “We have extremely rigorous procedures in place to maintain high levels. We produce a quality report every few months which is a detailed way of maintaining high standards.

“It is so closely and regularly monitored if there are areas that need addressing they are identified quickly.”