NHS facility reports strong response to improved healthcare access for busy Londoners

Wandsworth’s Clapham Junction Health Centre has announced a new timetable of available appointments, as the facility looks to impact upon public health by making services available seven days a week and at evenings and weekends.

Operated by Care UK, on behalf of NHS Wandsworth, the centre is making sure that skilled clinicians are available between 8am and 8pm, appreciating that poor access to healthcare can impact on the success of subsequent treatments.

As Care UK manager Nav Sahota explains: “Londoners lead busy, complicated lives, often involving long hours at work, expensive childcare arrangements and lots of commuting. All too often the only health services accessible in the evening or at weekends are urgent or emergency facilities. Working with our NHS commissioners, our vision was to create a health centre that makes it easy for local people to take good care of their health by increasing access to routine GP appointments. After all, identifying something like an infection or even cancer in the early stages is much easier and more cost effective to treat than leaving it until it’s a serious issue.”

Since announcing the timetable, the Centre already reports on a strong response from locals looking to become a registered patient, while the provider’s vision also includes opening up more specialist health services for which an admission to hospital would usually be necessary.

Examples of the Centre’s expanding expertise include physiotherapy and several minor surgeries, for which GPs are able to make referrals.

Manager Nav Sahota is delighted with the way her team has embraced the challenges, saying: “I have a talented and dedicated team who make a special effort to listen to our patients and act on their feedback. For the last two months, our patient surveys have shown that 94 per cent of our patients have rated the service good, very good or excellent.”

Care UK are among the UK's largest care providers, operating more than 100 facilities.