The scheme to operate distinctly different hospitals at Huddersfield and Calderdale has been hatched in a bid to improve outcomes for patients but also to save cash.

While hospital bosses are under pressure to save tens of millions, doctors have claimed they would push for the plan to go ahead even if money was no object.

That’s because studies have shown that larger specialist units incur fewer deaths and re-admission of patients who have already been treated.

The rationale has been used elsewhere, including the controversial decision to move maternity services from Huddersfield to Calderdale in 2006.

The relocation has allegedly improved the outcomes for all patients.

While funding is an issue, an even bigger problem is a lack of senior doctors, especially in A&E, something the British Medical Association called for the Government to address earlier this year.

The A&E units at the two hospitals have been heavily reliant on locums and are operating with seven permanent consultants when 12 are needed. The Trust has also admitted a shortage of middle grade A&E doctors.

The Trust claims patient safety at the moment is compromised as it cannot guarantee senior doctors availability at night or at weekends and will struggle to meet staffing levels required by the Government’s push for seven-day working.

Bosses say it makes more sense from a quality of care perspective to have all the doctors and expertise in one place.

It also removes the chances of operations being cancelled because a doctor is called away from one theatre to deal with an emergency such as a road accident.

From a dispassionate and intensely pragmatic point of view, the plan makes sense.

But for residents of Calderdale the anxiety of potentially losing 24 hour A&E cover on their doorsteps is understandable.

The reality is though that many 999 calls see patients driven right past CRH already.

Earlier this year an elderly woman was knocked down on the road outside the Halifax hospital but was driven to HRI for care.

And people with major head injuries or heart attacks are already taken to Leeds General Infirmary.

The travel issue is not to be ignored and perhaps hospital chiefs need to work with Highways to formulate some kind of special system to overcome the jams around the Calderdale Way and Ainley Top.

An ambulance only by-pass or special lane could be constructed to avoid the most notorious bottle necks.

But, as with any infrastructure project in this country, space and money is always an issue.

However, all of this potential upheaval is only a proposal until the clinical commissioning groups in Huddersfield and Calderdale take the issue off the shelf.

They are currently determined to wait until their expanded care in the community proposals are rolled out before they take a view on the impact of the hospital shake-up or allow the public to have their say.

But how long will that take?