Introduction
We are pleased to share an important update about the ongoing integration of Hamble Valley Health following the business merger of Blackthorn Health Centre and Hedge End Medical Centre on 1st October 2024.
While our two sites have been operating under a unified name, our clinical systems have remained separate. We are now preparing for the full system merger, which is scheduled to take place on 14th April 2025.
We have redesigned our operational working in line with our patient care priorities: Continuity, Consistency and Care Navigation.
Appointments:
From 14th April 2025, patients will have the option of either calling the surgery OR completing an eConsult for their symptoms. This change comes in response to feedback from our patients at the HEMC site, who have requested both options for some time. We believe this new system will help accommodate the needs of all our patients and provide greater flexibility in accessing care.
For patients who call us, we will have a list of presentations which will be suitable for self care, a different service, or an appointment at the Urgent Care Centre (more information on this below), and if your requirement meets these criteria, you will be directly booked. Alternatively, we will take some more detailed information and pass it on to the Clinical Assessment Team who will be in contact with you to advise on the type of appointment you need. For this reason, our reception team will need to ask you some questions about your medical issue to ensure you are correctly assessed.
We will still offer urgent and routine appointments and will contact you either by phone or text with an appropriate appointment.
In addition to the new eConsult and call options, we will continue to offer a range of other services. These include chronic disease review appointments with our nurses, cervical screening tests, COPD and asthma reviews, immunisations and more. You will receive a letter or text message with the details of your appointment when it is time for these services.
Our nurses will continue to provide appointments for immunisations, dressings, travel consultations, and other services. Please call us, or speak to our reception team to book these appointments at your convenience.
Urgent Care Centre (UCC)
The UCC will be based at the Lowford site and will host the majority of urgent care needs of our patients who are currently seen at the Blackthorn and Hedge End sites, we are planning for it to be up and running in May 2025.
The UCC, not to get confused with an Urgent Treatment Centre is not a walk-in clinic, nor will it have X-Ray facilities. It is for the patients across Hamble Valley Health, and you can only attend with a booked timeslot. The UCC will be managed by our own GPs and supported by an array of clinical staff, including our Advanced Clinical Practitioner team.
The aim of the UCC is to see non-complex acute presentations which will increase the routine and continuity GP appointment capacity at the BHC and HEMC sites, which will be managed by the remainder of the GPs and the wider clinical team.
Online Services:
BHC patients who are already registered for online services, for example the NHS App and Patient Access will see no changes to their access. Patients from our HEMC site will experience some change which will include:
- Online access for HEMC patients will be withdrawn from 7th April 2025 as we transition to the new system.
- From the 14th April, HEMC patients will need to re-register on the NHS App
- The NHS App may take up to five days to update
- With over 12,000 patients registered online and some manual work involved, this process will take time, so we appreciate your patience while we work through re-registration requests
Prescriptions:
If you are on repeat medication, you should continue to request it in the usual way. Bear in mind for patients registered at HEMC requests after the 7th April will no longer be able to be made through the app until the online access has been re-established. Therefore, if it is an urgent repeat prescription you will need to request these by paper at the surgery. If it is not urgent please wait until later in April. Please also be aware that requests between 7th to the 18th April 2025 could take up to a week to process.
If you are an HEMC patient and your medication is due between 6th and 16th April, you are welcome to put your prescription in from the beginning of April.
HEMC patient on Batch Prescriptions (Repeat Dispensing) will have their batch reset before the move and it will be restarted once the records are transferred.
Website and contacting us:
We will also be launching a new website and social media pages as well as getting one telephone number for the whole of Hamble Valley Health; however, our previous numbers will also still exist and connect to the new number.
Q&As:
Please raise all questions to our dedicated email address,
hiowicb-hsi.bhcmerger@nhs.net.
The questions received which are relevant for our patients will be updated on here.