NHS to consult on Clydesdale out-of-hours cover

However, some locals have already voiced doubts if anything that is said to health bosses between 6.30pm and 8.30pm in the Memorial Hall will make any real difference.

Nor do they believe the local service will be restored; it was lost last summer due to a lack of GPs willing to work at nights and weekends.

As previously reported in the Gazette, the area’s out-of-hours service, once based at Lanark Health Centre, was latterly based at Wishaw General Hospital, sometimes covered by Lanark GPs there.

Now NHS Lanarkshire, citing a country-wide shortage of doctors willing to work extra hours, proposes running the service from even further away – with an option between cover from a Hamilton health centre alone or from there and another one in Monklands.

NHS Lanarkshire has pledged to ensure there will be transport to take patients from Clydesdale to these centres.

Some in Clydesdale have already called this a ‘Hobson’s Choice’ for our area with neither option a substitute for a proper local service.

For more on this story pick up a copy of this week’s Carluke and Lanark Gazette, which is in the shops now.