麻豆社

NHS England plans to improve emergency care by bringing together accident and emergency services, out of hours GPs, pharmacists and the telephone service NHS 111.

The move comes after waiting time targets were persistently missed last winter, as performance fell to its lowest level in a decade.

鈥淲e will change services at a local level,鈥� said Prof Keith Willett, NHS England's Director of Acute Care.

While the 111 service had received terrible reviews in its early days, 16m people now use the service and 90% were satisfied, he said.

The current system was weakened as services were not connected, added the professor of orthopaedic trauma surgery at Oxford University.

In future, the 111 service would be connected to clinical advice from doctors, nurses, mental health services, dental services and pharmacies, and would have access patients' details to be able to give them the best advice.