GP blow as primary care staff to reduce 'appropriate routine work' for three weeks in Ayrshire

dailyrecord.co.uk:

Primary care staff at NHS Ayrshire & Arran have today been told to reduce “appropriate routine work” for three weeks as the health board battles a winter care crisis.In an announcement this afternoon, the organisation said the move was designed to ensure GP practices are “able to prioritise urgent care.”Today’s development comes hot on the heels of last week’s announcement that the heath board was to “pause” routine inpatient elective surgery for a period of three weeks- from Monday 9 January.According to today’s announcement routine work to be reduced includes “chronic disease management reviews” and “patient surveillance checks.”Other primary care and community services will “continue as normal.”A spokesperson for NHS Ayrshire & Arran said that demand for primary care and community services has “never been higher” in the region.The spokesperson continued: “In order to match this demand, primary care services across Ayrshire and Arran are seeing more patients each day than ever before.The Ayrshire Live app is available to download now.Get all the local news in your area – plus features, football news and the latest on the coronavirus crisis – at your fingertips 24/7.The free download features the latest breaking news and exclusive stories while you can customise your page with the sections that matter to you.The Ayrshire Live app is available to download now on iOS and Android.“The primary care and community teams are working exceptionally hard over extended hours to try and ensure that the communities they serve receive high quality and safe care.”Dr Crawford McGuffie, Medical Director at NHS Ayrshire & Arran said: “With such high demand, it is often necessary to triage (or sort into order) the patient contacts to