Ref. 22938-65It is not every day an area is built from scratch, but residents in Taw Hill have slowly formulated their own community. Kevin Shoesmith went out to speak to the people helping to forge a welcoming place to live.

LOOKING out of Taw Hill Surgery in Queen Elizabeth Drive, Dr Peter Crouch can see history being made before him as a new community emerges from wasteland.

Homes have been built for the last five-and-a-half years and now shops and other services are beginning to take shape.

Yards away, builders work on a new school and state-of-the-art surgery to serve Swindon's newest community which is just west of Haydon Wick, north Swindon.

Today his practice has 2,000 patients. When the new one opens in September, numbers will rise six fold, making it one of the fasting growing and most innovative surgeries in the country.

This is an exciting time for Dr Peter Crouch and partner Dr June Morris. For them, this will be their third move in five years.

To help cope with the increased workload, between 10 and 12 new medical staff will be taken on.

The practice has come a long since it opened on September 20, 1999, on the site of what is now the Tawny Owl pub.

The new practice will boast 10 consulting rooms, two operating theatres, and three treatment rooms.

The facilities will enable GPs across Swindon to refer patients for minor surgery, vasectomies and dermatology treatment.

In addition, it will become home for the Swindon Sanctuary a forensic medical centre for victims of rape and sexual assault. It will also house the Great Western Laser Unit.

Dr Crouch expressed his appreciation to both the Swindon Primary Care Trust and the planning department of Swindon Council, which, he says have given every help to get the plans from the drawing board to reality.

He said: "Both realise that new communities need new doctors.

"In other communities houses have been built but no thought has been given to the services. In this case careful consideration has been given to that."

Dr Crouch, 36, said he is determined to move his practice into the heart of the community.

He said: "We like the fact that the majority of the patients are the same age as us. We will be growing old together and we like that."

That is not to say, however, that the community will not encounter its fair share of problems.

Dr Crouch says he has already noticed an increase in stress-related illnesses, as more and more high-flyers move in.

He said: "Because a lot of our patients are young professionals we're seeing a lot of stress and exhaustion. People seem to be working too hard at their careers."

The doctor says that the problem may be made worse by a baby boom in the new community.

"We're seeing a lot of people trying for families. With that of course, is the problem of post-natal depression as people attempt to juggle too much."

Dr Crouch is now looking forward to forging close links with the St Francis Primary School which will open in September.

"Most of the children who will be starting there next September were born when we first opened five years ago," he said.

Kevin Shoesmith