I AM increasingly concerned about difficulties local people have in understanding the arr-angements for accessing emergency care.

I have not seen clear instructions about this. Does everyone know that it is necessary to make an appointment to be seen in the Primary Care Centre (PCC) at Kidderminster Hospital when GP surgeries are closed between 6.30pm and 8am during the week and from 6.30pm on Fridays until 8am on Mondays?

The telephone number for the call centre to access the PCC is 0845 609 0669. The PCC is intended for problems that cannot wait until GP surgeries are next open. I presume the minor injuries unit (MIU), for which one does not need an appointment, is only for bumps, bruises, cuts, sprains and minor accidents and as it is at the same location as the primary care centre but open 24 hours a day I receive letters from people who turn up to the MIU but are turned away as not suitable. Then, even though they are on the spot, they have to request an appointment with the PCC or dial 999 to be taken to the A&E department at Worcester.

This confusion is not surprising as the PCC is under Wyre Forest Primary Care Trust (PCT), the out-of-hours service under South Worcestershire PCT and the MIU under the Acute Hospitals Trust!

At least the unwelcome merger of the three county PCTs will combine two of these organisations. But to me the greatest help would be to amalgamate the PCC and MIU under single control, with well-publicised guidelines about when appointments are needed, when in emergency one can turn up unannounced, when and where there is a doctor or a nurse in attendance, when one should dial 999 and when one should ring NHS Direct.

I have raised these concerns with Eamonn Kelly, our PCT chief executive who will pass them on as he is being promoted as a consequence of the PCT mergers.

Across the country Strategic Health Authorities are being reduced by two-thirds and PCTs from over 300 to about 100. I hope to be able to find out the costs of redundancies as a part of my Health Select Committee work!

Today the three Worcestershire Members of the Youth Parliament, Gareth Griffiths, Paul Ingenthron and Philip Powell, all from King Charles I High School, will be visiting the House of Commons.

They will observe the Health Select Committee at work and then, if they have time, attend a debate. I will meet them and they hope to report their visit in the Shuttle/Times & News next week to raise the profile of the Youth Parliament that is not sufficiently known among our young people.

The turnout for the latest elections was low, partly due to poor publicity as one of our local schools had had no notification of the elections despite providing successful MYPs recently.