NEARLY 90 per cent of patients across South Worcestershire can access GP services seven days a week between 8am and 8pm, according to figures released today.

274, 486 patients in the southern section of the county, which includes Worcester, Malvern, Evesham, Droitwich and Ledbury, have access to the full provision – with 28 of 31 practices currently offering the extended services.

St John’s House Surgery is the only Worcester GP practice which does not offer full extended opening hours, the BBC’s shared data unit has revealed.

The investigation was carried out in light of the government’s pledge to ensure all patients had access to a full extended service on evenings and weekends by October 1.

The other surgeries operated by South Worcestershire Clinical Commissioning Group which have failed to offer the full extended service are Salters Medical Practice in Droitwich and Tenbury Surgery in Tenbury Wells.

According to the report, the Midlands and the East of England has the highest percentage of practices offering no extended hours and weekend appointments – with 19 per cent.

The Cameron-Clegg coalition government had originally made the high-profile pledge to introduce extended opening hours for every patient, in 2014, with the end of March 2019 the initial cut off.

But with only 41 per cent of GP practices surveyed currently offering full access to extended hours, and with a new more ambitious target date set – time is running out.

Though, while Labour has accused the government of “breaking its promises” on extended care, NHS England has assured it is on track to meet its target, investing at least £258m this year for the improvements.

The Shadow Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, Jonathan Ashworth MP said: “This is yet more evidence that the Tories have broken their promises on access to GPs seven days a week.

“The truth is that years of austerity has taken its toll on general practice. We need a serious long-term investment plan for primary care."

While the scheme means mandatory access to pre-bookable and same day appointments, these are not necessarily at the patient’s own practice and can be run by federations of GPs or hub sites as it will not be obligatory for GPs to provide the access.

A Department of Health spokesperson said: “We want everyone to have access to GP services, including routine appointments at evenings and weekends - and already millions of patients have benefitted from this which is backed by our investment of an extra £2.4 billion a year into general practice by 2021.”

BMA, GP committee chair, Dr Richard Vautrey said: “While schemes like this [extended access] are rolled out and are successful in providing the services they are commissioned to do, we still believe the money invested in such programmes would be better spent improving core GP services.

“We know that patients are frustrated with being unable to get timely appointments during regular working hours, owing to increased demand and unmanageable GP workloads, and therefore it is these services that should be a priority for proper funding.”

A Worcestershire CCG spokeswoman said work is ongoing to ensure 100 per cent access is achieved by October.

“Currently we are offering Worcestershire patients registered with a local GP partial access to evening and weekend routine appointments," she said.

“Work is ongoing to increase this to the national target set by NHS England of 100 per cent for the whole county by October 2018.”