Following their latest meeting with the Health Board at Minafon surgery on 22nd December, Nia Griffith MP and Councillors Ryan Thomas, Mike Thomas and Philip Thompson said:
“We are pleased that we have been able to work with the Health Board to make progress and we will continue to work to ensure our community gets the best possible local health care. Here are some of the issues we pursued at this meeting:
1: Recruitment: The Surgery has been able to recruit a further three part time GPs including one woman doctor to support the existing GP complement. Whilst this means that there is now over 2 FTE GPs we are stillvery concerned that this is short of the full establishment of 5 GPs. The Health Board has assured us that it is still actively seeking to recruit further GPs including using recruitment consultants beyond the UK. We were pleased to hear that it has received further expressions of interest from practitioners in being appointed the surgery. The Health Board also pointed out that the range of integrated support services now available in the surgery was making it more attractive to potential recruits and that locum cover would continue to be provided. We shall keep the pressure up on this.
2: Telephone Triage service: Following on from the sudden withdrawal of the Rosedale Group from its commitment to run a practice in Llanelli, we raised concerns about the possibility of this happening to the telephone triage service at Minafon. The Health Board gave assurances that the contractor was a different section of the Rosedale Group and was contractually bound to the provision of the telephone service and could not leave without giving a minimum three months’ notice.
3: Ante Natal Clinics: We expressed ongoing concern and disappointment that the plan to split the provision between Trimsaran and Kidwelly on alternate weeks so that residents in both areas can access the service without excessive travel had not yet been actioned and asked for this to be sorted as a matter of utmost urgency. The Health Board gave assurances that there is provision for this, and we will continue to stress the urgency.
We will continue to monitor progress closely and to press the Health Board for improvements.”