THE NHS 111 number went live across the whole of the North-East today (Monday April 1) – although other parts of the UK have seen a delay in the service after a catalogue of errors.

The cheaper replacement service for NHS Direct – designed for people to access healthcare when it is not a 999 emergency – was piloted in the County Durham and Darlington areas, where it has been running since August 2010.

The scheme was rolled out to the South Tyne and Wear area and the North Yorkshire area last month, and today it was extended to two more areas, North Tyne and Tees.

A spokeswoman for NHS England today denied that the national rollout of the scheme had been aborted, but admitted that in some areas it had been delayed.

She said: “As each new area prepares to go live with NHS 111, the service is thoroughly assessed and tested to ensure they are fully prepared before they go live.

"The next area to go live with the service is in the North-East of England. The service will be provided by the North East Ambulance Service who already provide excellent service, so after a thorough assessment we have decided this should go ahead.”

However, she admitted: “Issues in some areas mean we have slowed down their rollout.

“It has always been the case that areas would only be able to go live with the NHS 111 service when it was thoroughly tested. This testing will now be further expanded to cover the provider’s ability to meet the peaks and demands of operating the service during times of highest demand.”

The British Medical Association’s GP leader last week wrote to Sir David Nicholson, the head of the NHS, warning that patients were facing immediate risk during the Easter bank holiday weekend and urging him to stall the service until it could be delivered safely.

This came after the Manchester system was shut down just 11 hours into its introduction after a number of errors, West Midlands stopped after three days when the provider was unable to cope with demand and in Wiltshire the new service dispatched paramedics to patients with sore throats, ear ache and a painful wrist.

NHS England said there were just 13 areas that still had to go live with NHS 111 and they would be phased as and when thorough testing was complete.

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