PATIENTS at a doctor’s surgery in Great Sankey have been told they will have to travel more than four miles to see a GP as they are being transferred to another health centre when their surgery closes down.

They have had just a fortnight’s notice after being sent a letter or text about the transfer.

The move is going to affect nearly 6,500 patients who have no choice but to go to a surgery at the Orford Jubilee Park Health Centre.

That has to be just about the busiest part of town and will be an absolute nightmare to get there at any time of day never mind early morning appointments.

The Jubilee Health Centre is just off Winwick Road – a place to be avoided at all costs – especially at the moment with more roadworks being carried out.

What about the most frequent users of any doctor’s surgery are the elderly. Many will still be driving but lots of older people lose their confidence and become nervous travelling to places they are not familiar with. Battling with early morning commuters will no doubt be exceptionally stressful for them.

Then are mums with children to ferry about, who’ll all have to be loaded into a car instead of being able to walk to their doctor’s. Not forgetting those people who don’t have a car – it’s just going to make it harder all round.

Many of the patients have already tried to register at other nearby surgeries like Chapelford and Westbrook, but have been told those patient lists are closed.

The NHS says its primary concern is to ensure all patients continue to have access to the full range of high quality primary care services.

But nothing beats that good old-fashioned relationship with a trusted family doctor – something which sadly seems to be dying out. You expect your GP to be close by, ideally within walking distance but certainly not in another district of Warrington.

On the subject of doctors, a letter by Andrew Hutchinson in last week’s paper caught my eye. He was bemoaning the new system at my own medical centre in Stockton Heath.

The new system called Doctor First means you call up for an appointment and a doctor will phone you back. But as Andrew rightly points out he was told he had to wait anytime up to midday after calling at 8.35am.

This is certainly no use if you are working. Even if the doctor is prepared to phone you back on your mobile, like Andrew says, do you really want to be discussing your delicate health problems with your colleagues ear-wigging.

However, there are always two sides to every story and a colleague says she called for an appointment at 3pm and a doctor called her at 4pm. He recommended a course of treatment and said her prescription would be ready to be collected from the pharmacy at 6pm. So she was more than happy with the service.

Certainly if you look at the centre’s website there are good comments on there about the new system – but perhaps they just don’t publish the bad ones?

But I’m reserving judgement until I’ve had to use it myself ... hopefully not anytime soon!