New ‘111’ number to replace NHS Direct
Date: Thursday, October 13th 2011
Categories: All Leicestershire
As you may have heard, the health information service NHS Direct is being replaced by a new '111' telephone number - which should be available nationally by April 2013.
The new service will be available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, staffed by call advisers supported by nurses.
Callers will be given advice about what to do and will also be directed to the appropriate local service. For example, callers may be helped to make an appointment with their GP or to call an ambulance in an emergency.
The Government hopes the new service will abolish the concept of 'out of hours' in the NHS.
The service has already been trialled in a number of small areas and is due to be piloted in County Durham, Nottingham, Lincolnshire and Luton.
We'll keep you up to date with more news about the new service as and when we know more details.
The '999' number for emergencies will remain unchanged and it'll still be fine to contact your GP directly of course - the new number is only intended to improve the current NHS Direct service.
(0) Comments:
There are no comments for this news item yet. Why not start the discussion? - use the form below:
Commenting is not available in this channel entry.
