TENS of thousands of people in Bournemouth and Poole will be cared for by a new ‘super partnership’ of GP surgeries.

Some 58,500 patients in the conurbation will receive their care via the new Shore Medical, which will unite five practices.

The surgeries involved are:

  • Poole Road Medical Centre in Poole Road, Bournemouth
  • Wessex Road Surgery in Wessex Road, Poole
  • Parkstone Tower Practice in Mansfield Road, Poole
  • Heatherview Medical Centre and Fernside Surgery in Alder Road, Parkstone
  • Lilliput Surgery in Elms Avenue, Parkstone

Bosses at Dorset’s clinical commissioning group say staffing and services at individual practices will continue as normal.

Patients will continue to be cared for by their established GPs and nurses.

Dr Andy Rutland, senior partner at the Lilliput Surgery, said any changes noticed by patients should be positive, with extended hours, specialist clinics and improved administrative support planned as part of the scheme.

“The five local practices have been working together on many projects for some years now,” Dr Rutland said this week.

“The move to formalise this arrangement as Shore Medical allows us to take advantage of new investments in GP services that the government recently announced.

“We would like to offer reassurance that we see this as great news for the patients of all the surgeries involved.

“All the sites will continue to offer full NHS healthcare to their registered patients, and we have exciting plans to improve our services, hopefully with the full engagement and support of our patients.

“Joining with other practices puts all members in a really good position to manage the well documented challenges that primary care faces, including offering appropriate access to care at the right time within the limited resource that our NHS has available.”

Those who currently use any of the surgeries involved will soon be invited to have their say on the merger, Dr Rutland said.

“We will shortly be announcing a date for a patient engagement evening where patients can come and ask questions to the team and find out a bit more about what this means for you,” he added.

“Information regarding Shore Medical will shortly be available in each surgery.

“Patients registered at the individual practices do not need to do anything to continue accessing services at their practice.”

Some of those who use the five practices were informed by text early this week.

However, it is understood that messages were sent out pre-emptively. Final confirmation of the partnership was announced several days later.

On Monday, some patients of the Poole Road Medical Centre were sent texts which read: “Dear patient, we have some exciting news.

“Poole Road Medical Centre has merged with four our practices to form a new super partnership.”

Patients were then directed to the surgery’s website. No further information was available online at that point.

In 2017, the Parkstone Health Centre in Mansfield Road and the Madeira Practice in Madeira Road became one practice – Parkstone Tower Practice.

Before the two were merged, the surgeries cared for some 20,000 patients between them.