AN OUT of hours emergency GP service is to be officially launched at Burnley General Hospital on Saturday.

The service, which provides emergency cover for patients through the night, started at the beginning of this month and has been a success.

The service, which involves 39 GPs, is run from the hospital's main out-patient department.

A similar service involving 25 GPs run from the Pendle Community Hospital, Nelson, was launched on June 10.

Burnley Health Care NHS Trust would like to see an out of hours service in Rossendale as well, but so far, there has been no formal approach from GPs in the area.

Trust chief executive David Chew said: "Once the service has settled in, there is great potential to develop links with accident and emergency so that we ensure patients presenting as emergencies can be dealt with in the right setting."

The trust board heard that in Burnley half the patients using the service had visited the hospital, one-in-five had received advice over the telephone, and only one-in-four needed a home visit.

But board member Frank Clifford sounded a note of caution. "I wonder what demands this service will put on the ambulance service," he said.

"I hope people will not use the emergency services inappropriately. We don't want the ambulance service to be further stretched. It's not a taxi service."

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