Whitby Group Practice

Out of hours

Out of hours is from 6pm to 8am on weekdays and all of the weekend and any public holidays.

On November 1st 2004, the Scarborough, Whitby, Ryedale Primary Care Trust took over responsibility for GP out of hours services for all GP Practices in this area. They initially commissioned North Yorkshire Emergency Doctors to provide this service, and subsequently have commissioned Primecare to provide this service. A number of local GPs do out of hours sessions for Primecare, but Primecare also employs locums and other doctors to fill the remaining sessions. The new North Yorkshire and York PCT (formed by the merger of 4 North Yorkshire PCTs) is responsible for commissioning out of hours services from 1st October 2006.

Improvements to out of hours cover

January 2007

The local GPs (Whitby, Sleights, Egton, Danby, Sandsend and Staithes practices) and the PCT have negotiated a special personal medical services contract to provide out of hours cover for the area on weeknights. This means that a local GP will be providing the out of hours GP cover until 11pm on normal (not public holiday) weekday nights. There are many advantages to patients, local GPs and the provider organisations of this arrangement. 

After 11pm the on call Primecare doctor covering our area is based in Pickering and patients will normally be asked to attend the out of hours Primary Care Centre in Pickering if they need a doctor after 11pm on weeknights.  Only patients whose medical condition requires it will get home visits. At weekends and public holidays Primecare provide all the GP cover to our area.

Patients should still access out of hours through Primecare.

In some ways this is a partial return to the out of hours service that we were able to provide before the PCT took over responsibility for out of hours.

Local GPs will continue to provide Whitby Community Hospital cover on weekend and public holiday mornings

It is very important that patients who need to see a GP during the out of hours period should contact Primecare and not attend the Minor Injuries Unit (MIU) in Whitby Hospital (nor should they attend the Accident and Emergency department in Scarborough). The MIU is there for minor injuries, so patients with problems that need a GP will be advised to contact their GP during the in-hours period or Primecare out of hours.