WUC unsure when Strabane out of hours service will return

REPRESENTATIVES for Western Urgent Care (WUC) have said they would need twice their current budget in order to reinstate out of hours (OOH) healthcare services in Strabane.

Revealed during a presentation at council’s Health and Community Committee meeting on Thursday, WUC’s head of Business Support, Mr Pat Brolly said that overall healthcare provision was a “challenging environment, and OOH is not immune to that.”

He added that filling clinical rotas, particularly in Strabane, Limavady and Omagh, was particularly challenging due to GPs not having an obligation to work OOH.

“Also, like any part of the health service, there are budgetary challenges,” Mr Brolly said. “We provide additional financial support to OOH, and we’re always mindful to make sure this public money is used efficiently”.

Sinn Féin councillor Paul Boggs initially proposed the presentation, as his Strabane constituents had been “raising the issue [of lack of OOH service] constantly.”

He noted that the removal of evening slots for GPs in Strabane was supposed to be a temporary measure, and also asked if there were plans to reinstate them.

Cllr Boggs said, “When we got a deputation from Western Health, their plan was to keep people away from our bigger sites like Altnagelvin. However we don’t have the services at a local level, particularly in Strabane town.

“It’s not there. People are frustrated because they feel they’re taking up an Emergency Department seat, where they may not need to be if someone had seen them locally to provide a prescription or more guidance.

“I welcome that you can have a conversation over the phone or face-to-face remotely, and that might be adequate for you, but there are still a number of people that don’t need to be in A&E but have nowhere else to go.”

WUC’s Medical Manager, Enda McSorley, is a GP working out of Strabane. He said there was a contractual obligation to have OOH services in all five bases, including Strabane, but this was “really, really difficult with our current budget.”

“In fact, it’s impossible to run the service how we’d like on the budget we have,” Dr McSorley said. “Seven or eight years ago we had a GP in Strabane, doing OOH on evenings from Monday to Friday, and covering the weekend.

“That’s why the service hasn’t been as good. It’s very haphazard as the GPs have been booking minimal shifts, so it wasn’t where it should have been.

“There needs to be value for money, so if you’re paying people they need to be working. We are going to need a dream budget in the next month to keep these bases going with doctors, support staff, and advanced nurse practitioners.”

Dr McSorley concluded, “I can’t say when Strabane will be up and running, because I don’t know how much money we’ll get next month. We’re trying to make the best of what we have.”