'Urgent care centre failed to cut A&E numbers'

An urgent care centre set up to ease the pressure on Reading's A&E is to close two-and-a-half years after opening.

The facility in Broad Street Mall allows people with urgent but not life-threatening conditions to get treatment by walking in off the street, although patients can also pre-book appointments.

The hope was it would lead to a sharp drop in the number of people turning up at Royal Berkshire Hospital (RBH) - but figures show the centre has not had the desired effect.

It is not the end of the project though as a new urgent care centre will open in the hospital itself. People will need to call NHS 111 before they can be referred.

Figures collected in the first year of the service showed that even when more people turned up at the centre looking for help they were matched by similar rises at the hospital itself.

A report by the Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire West Integrated Care Board, which oversees the current urgent care centre, said it saw no significant improvement in the number of patients seen by doctors at the RBH's A&E after the centre was opened.

As for the new urgent care centre, the care board said: "By being closer to the RBH's accident and emergency department, the urgent care centre will be able to treat those patients who need to be seen on the same day but who don't need the specialist support of the A&E team.

"The service will ensure patients are treated by the most appropriate healthcare professional, resulting in shorter waiting times and enabling A&E staff to treat patients who most need emergency and specialist care."

The new centre will start operating on 1 July.