3rd December 2024

Belfast Health and Social Care Trust is committed to ensuring our General Practice Out of Hours (GP OOH) services are of the highest possible quality and are effective and compassionate.
We want to ensure that service users, and families, staff and the public at large have an opportunity to consider and comment on the proposed reorganisation of GP Out of Hours services.
Belfast Trust is responsible for the provision of GP Out of Hours services for the population of Belfast. Over recent years, there have been challenges in maintaining out of hours service provision at the two bases on the Crumlin Road and the Knockbreda Health and Wellbeing site.
We have already engaged with and explained what changes we are proposing to modernise the service and address the challenges that it faces. This includes the rationale for introducing a multi-disciplinary service with nurses, paramedics and pharmacists – so that the service is no longer reliant on one single profession and to free up GPs to attend to those who are more acutely unwell.
In order to make the best use of public monies, we consider it would be more cost-effective and more efficient to provide the service from one base, alongside the relatively newly established Phone First service. Moving to one site with the newly introduced skill mix would make considerable economies of scale by consolidating resources and would address the significant, increasing overspend that the service is facing year on year.
Evidence has shown that the current model is no longer sustainable and frequently, unfortunately we have had to close one site due to workforce issues.
Belfast Trust is now launching a consultation on these proposed changes. There is an upcoming public information session, on Thursday 5th December between 7pm and 8.30pm at Knockbracken Hall, Knockbracken Healthcare Park, BT8 9BH. You can register your attendance by completing this short form.
The consultation has also been available online, running for 13 weeks and closing on Thursday 2 January 2025.
We would encourage as many people as possible to have their say in this consultation. You can find full details, including the consultation paper on the Citizen Space website:
We thank you in advance for taking the time to give us your feedback and look forward to your comments.