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Carisbrooke Medical Centre and Dower House set to merge

Carisbrooke Medical Centre and Dower House Surgery are set to merge this Autumn – to help improve and sustain our services to you in the long-term.

NHS Isle of Wight Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) has approved our formal merger from October 1.

We have previously informed your representatives on our Patient Participation Group of our intentions – and they understand our thinking and why this move is being planned.

A full patient Question and Answers factsheet is available in reception, which will hopefully answer your questions.

GP partners at both practices and the CCG strongly believe that the mergers is in the best interest of patients at a time of growing demand and pressures on primary services with people living longer - including many with more complex long-term health conditions.

Both sites will remain open and there are no threats to any staff jobs.

They will help both practice offer you – our patients - a bigger pool of clinical skills and staffing resources and far greater resilience, with more robust cover for staff holiday leave and sickness.

Other benefits for us will include: a better range of appointments, with patients being offered appointments at either side, the ability to be able to develop new services, bring in other health professionals to be able to meet their patients’ diverse needs, a better ability to recruit and bring in a range of GPs who have other skills, such as dermatology and mental health – again better meeting their patients’ needs, developing specialist admin teams to deal more efficiently with patient requests.

Our two practices are already working closely together, and the merger will help build on existing relationships.

In 2018, we joined forces to launch a new minor illness service to help meet the demand for same-day appointments – and commissioned a musculo-skeletal service (MSK) and piloted a prescription ordering service.

Dr Timothy Whelan from Dower House, said: “We are already facing problems recruiting GPs who have left or retired – and Carisbrooke also has GPs who are nearing retirement. Together, our two practices will be much stronger to face future challenges and be better placed to further improve our services to patients.”

Dr Judith More from Carisbrooke, added: “Patients will have greater choice by choosing which medical centre they attend – although some specialist services or clinics may only be available at one of them. Our practices have already proved that they work well together to improve patient services.”