Two doctors who have been working as locums GPs at Lockerbie Medical Practice will take over the running of the surgery from June.
Dr Michael Ramsden will head the practice with Dr Kashif Ahmad after being awarded the contract responsible for almost 5,000 patients.
It ends months of uncertainty since Lanarkshire-based Alba Medical Group – who took over on April 1 last year – gave notice on their contract and will leave on May 31.
The Alba contract has been beset with problems and complaints from patients with concerns about the service raised in the Scottish Parliament.
It forced a national tendering process for the GP contract to be launched on December 14, seeking expressions of interest from potential providers.
This week, NHS Dumfries and Galloway announced that Dr Ahmad and Dr Ramsden had been successful in their bid to take over responsibility for managing services.
Dr Ramsden said: “We are looking forward to developing a practice which can provide quality care for the people of Lockerbie and surrounding areas. We realise they have been through a turbulent time over the past number of years and faced a lot of uncertainty. Particularly, we want to improve patient access, increase face-to-face contact and restore care for those with long-term health problems.
“However, we hope people will understand it will take time to realise our ambition, that things won’t change overnight, and that the health service still remains under strain.
“We are dedicated to the multi-disciplinary approach already undertaken at the surgery and encouraged by the current GP contract in Scotland, which means you will see different types of clinicians depending on your problem, and see this as essential to survival of the surgery when demand is only increasing and recruitment and retention of GPs is difficult.”
Before Alba Medical Group’s year at the helm, responsibility for the day-to-day running of the practice had been with the health board since the death of Dr George Porteous in October, 2018, and not – as is the normal model – with the practices themselves.
It had to reduce its list of 5,500 patients by moving around 700 to neighbouring Lochmaben Medical Group and meant a heavy reliance on the availability of temporary locum doctors rather than permanent GPs. Measures to help included an increase in the number of advanced nurse practitioners.
Deputy medical director Dr Grecy Bell said: “NHS Dumfries and Galloway welcomes the outcome of a process aimed at securing an independent contractor to deliver general medical services out of Lockerbie. This now places Lockerbie Medical Practice in line with the majority of other GP practices within the region.”
Annandale North Councillor Carolyne Wilson added: “This has been a hugely frustrating time for patients in the Lockerbie area who have been left in limbo recently and had such disruption to their GP services. I hope this will be the start of an improvement and I’ll continue to work with the community and NHS to support people to secure the long term future of Lockerbie surgery and the best possible service.”
