GAZETTE & HERALD: Chippenham Hospital's Minor Injuries Unit could be taken over by Wiltshire Medical Services, which operates the new out of hours service.

Wiltshire Medical Services took over the out of hours medical care for the entire Kennet and North Wiltshire primary care trust area on October 1 and the company is set to expand its operations further.

Now discussions are underway between WMS and the Primary Care Trust, which could result in the minor injuries unit coming under the WMS umbrella in a bid to provide an efficient and seamless service.

"At this stage we have got as far as expressing an interest in this idea," said Dr Jamie Brosch of WMS.

"It arises from the fact that the two services work hand in hand anyway and any division is somewhat artificial. There are also potentially problems over which service is responsible for whom."

WMS, a commercial company set up by Dr Brosch, from Chippenham, Dr Andrew Cowie, from Corsham, and Dr Martin Searle, from Calne, is based at Chippenham Hospital.

The out of hours service is already working closely with the MIU and their services overlap for example, if a patient brought in by ambulance needs nursing care.

It has not been decided whether the staff at the MIU would be employed by the PCT or WMS. "We will look at this over the coming months," said Dr Brosch. "One of the issues to be discussed is human resources.

"It would streamline the service but the preliminary groundwork to set it up would take at least six months and it would have to go out for discussion."

The MIU at Chippenham is open 24 hours seven days a week and the out of hours service only operates when the doctors' surgeries are closed, though their management and administration staff are working 24/7.

The new out of hours provision was discussed at a meeting of the PCT on Tuesday.

In a report, the service offered by WMS was praised as successful and robust, despite a high volume of calls over the Christmas and New Year holiday period.

More developments are under way, with WMS taking over the out of hours cover for the 400 plus inmates at Erlestoke Prison, as well as running a call despatching service for neighbouring PCT's which are using NHS Direct as the first point of call for their out of hours service.

Discussion is on-going between the PCT and the RAF about the possibility of WMS providing the out of hours cover for RAF personnel and their families at Lyneham and Corsham.

"We had a meeting with our staff and those at the minor injuries units between Christmas and New Year and the over-riding message was that they had done incredibly well." said Dr Brosch.

A total of 8,410 calls were taken between October 1 and December 31 2004.

ssingleton@newswilts.co.uk