THE private company that runs the GP out-of-hours service in Worcestershire has come under fire from a national health watchdog.

Nationwide concerns were raised about Take Care Now (TCN) yesterday by the Care Quality Commission (CQC), the national health watchdog, following the death in February of 70-year-old David Gray, accidentally killed by a German doctor on his first out-of-hours-shift in Britain. Chiefs at NHS Worcestershire have always maintained that their own investigation of TCN is linked to complaints from local GPs and has nothing to do with Dr Daniel Ubani who killed his patient by accident when he gave him ten times the normal dose of diamorphine in Cambridgeshire.

TCN has a contract with five primary care trusts, including NHS Worcestershire and the interim report, published yesterday by the CQC, said there were fears that health bosses were not doing enough to monitor the work of TCN.

The CQC report said all primary care trusts should monitor the work of TCN more closely, including the efficiency of call handling and care assessment, unfilled shifts, the proportion of shifts covered by non-local doctors and the induction and training they receive.

TCN took over the running of the service from NHS Worcestershire – formerly Worcestershire Primary Care Trust – last October. The out-of-hours service allows people to get treatment from a doctor when their GP surgery is closed such as late into the evening and at weekends.

Simon Hairsnape, NHS Worcestershire’s director of delivery, said the organisation was subject to monthly, weekly and even daily monitoring while unannounced visits were also arranged.

Mr Hairsnape said: “It is very much ongoing work with TCN. We intend them to hold them to account for the services they deliver to local people.”

Chief executive Paul Bates has consistently said that the out-of-hours service in Worcestershire is managed better by TCN than it was by his own organisation, NHS Worcestershire.

Mr Hairsnape said the level of complaints from the public was always at a low level compared to before, but said there had been concerns from GPs. He did not reveal the nature of the GPs’ concerns.