Nurses to Cover for GP Call-Outs

Nurses instead of doctors are being sent out on home visits in County Durham in a bid to claw back health service deficits.

The pilot scheme has been set up at Middle Chare Surgery in Chester-le-Street.

Emergency Care Practitioners, nurses who have an extra level of training, are doing home visits during the day on Mondays and Wednesdays rather than GPs.

The move comes after Durham and Chester-le-Street Primary Care Trust (PCT) reported an overspend in its GP out-of-hours budget.

It initially asked doctors to take a pay cut for out-of-hours home visits to bring spending back into line, but after GPs protested it is looking at other ways to make savings.

Dr John Preston, a GP at Middle Chare and the PCT’s executive committee chairman, said yesterday: “This seems to be a win-win situation. The Emergency Care Practitioners are helping us with our workload and, because of that, we are paying the PCT pounds 10 each time they go out.

“That is helping the PCT with their budget.”

At the moment, the PCT is pounds 60,000 overspent on its out-of- hours budget.