New plans to improve Forth Valley GP services

The Forth Valley Primary Care Premises Programme, aims to tackle rising demand for GP services and address the size, condition and layout constraints faced by many GP practices across the area.

It sets out proposals for a major programme of investment to improve local GP premises and associated healthcare facilities to ensure they can accommodate the staff and services required now and, in the future, as well as redesign the way a number of existing GP services are delivered and developed to meet the commitments of the new national General Medical Services Contract.

Kathy O’Neill, general manager for primary care and mental health, NHS Forth Valley, said: “These are ambitious and wide-ranging plans which will ultimately benefit all 50 GP practices in the Forth Valley area.

"We have already made a significant investment to recruit more than 200 additional healthcare professionals to support local GP Practices.

"We therefore need to ensure that there is suitable accommodation and facilities to accommodate these staff who provide thousands of healthcare appointments every month alongside their GP colleagues.

“This will support the future expansion of community-based health services and ensure we are able to keep pace with rising demand for local services as the population of Forth Valley continues to increase.”

These future plans would ensure all existing GP Practices continue to provide a wide range of core health services (including urgent on the day care and care for patients with long-term health conditions who require longer-term care and treatment).

It would also see the ongoing development and delivery of multi-practice services to enable staff employed by NHS Forth Valley to provide support to a number of GP practices and the development of locality hubs where a number of services for some GP practices are provided within larger premises, freeing up space within individual GP Practices to accommodate more local staff and services.

Detailed work has been undertaken over the last 18 months with GPs.