Walk-in Centre set for shot in the arm

GTD Primary Care is to take over the running of Oldham’s flagship Walk-in Centre from NHS Oldham on April 1.

The service at Oldham Integrated Care Centre will join forces with Lindley Medical Practice, which GTD Primary Care — a subsidiary of GO to DOC — already manages at the centre.

The practice already provides walk-in services as well as registered GPs. Bosses say patients will begin to see improvements as the integration will reduce duplication.

The new single-management arrangements will be provided through the practice. The public will continue to be able to walk in with urgent medical problems between 7am and 11pm seven days a week.

In a joint statement, the organisations said: “There will be one reception desk that patients can go to, in order to avoid confusion, and the clinical teams will be combined to ensure staffing can be best used to ensure shorter waiting times.

“The GPs in the service are permanently employed, so the public will see greater continuity and consistency whether they are accessing the new combined service as a registered patient with an appointment or as an unregistered walk-in patient.

“Lindley Medical Practice, formerly Lindley House Medical Centre, has developed specialist expertise in dealing with families, young people and sexual health complaints.

“This expertise will be available for all the patients that have traditionally used the Walk-in Centre on the ground floor of the Oldham Integrated Care Centre.”

The GO to DOC out-of-hours GP service will continue to be based on the ground floor at the centre.

GO to DOC is a local not-for-profit healthcare provider that started in Oldham in 1997 as a GP co-operative and since 2004 has also operated as an independent provider of urgent primary care services.

The organisation says it re-invests surplus money back into the health economy to maximise value for money for the public.

In November, the Walk-in Centre reduced its opening times from 24-hours-a-day to 7am-11pm to save £528,000 a year. An average of four patients a night were using it for minor issues.