A massive shake-up in the way community healthcare services in Brad-ford are managed has been approved by the Department of Health.

From October 1, the four primary care trusts serving Bradford and Airedale North, South and West, City and Airedale will be replaced by just one organisation for the entire district.

It will be called Bradford and Airedale Teaching Primary Care Trust and will be responsible for providing all community-based health services such as GPs, dentists, pharmacists and opticians.

The announcement, made yesterday by Patricia Hewitt, Secretary of State for Health, follows a 14-week public consultation. For the next five months the four primary care trusts will hold joint board meetings to help staff begin to start planning the health care for the population of the whole district.

Matt Walsh, who stepped down from his role as acting chief executive of Bradford South and West Primary Care Trust to be joint project director, responsible for bringing the Airedale and Bradford PCTs together, said: "It makes sense to start to share resources and work towards common goals as soon as possible and to plan the best way of providing services for patients across the whole district.

"Although PCTs will continue legally to be separate entities with their own budgets until the end of September, it is important that the four boards meet together to share information and resources, tackle financial issues together and start to have a common agenda.

"The aim of these arrangements is to help make sure that patients face no disruption to their services and that targets for improving health services continue to be met during the transition period."

The proposal to re-structure all PCTs nationally was put forward last August by the Department of Health in a paper called Commissioning a Patient-led NHS.

The aim of the proposed changes was to organise services in the most efficient and effective way to deliver improved patient care. The changes are aimed at reducing by at least 15 per cent management and administrative costs and to improve co-ordination with social services by having the same Local Govern-ment boundaries.

A 90-day formal consultation is currently being carried out with staff so transfers to the new PCT can begin.

The new chairman of the PCT is expected to be appointed by June with the new chief executive decided after that. The first joint board meeting will be held at 1pm on Wednesday, May 24, at New Mill in Saltaire. Meetings will be chaired by the four PCT chairmen on a rotational basis.

In West Yorkshire the reconfiguration will mean West Yorkshire Strategic Health Authority will join up with the two neighbouring health authorities for South Yorkshire and North and East Yorkshire and Northern Lincolnshire.

The number of primary care trusts will be reduced from 15 to five with one each for Bradford, Calderdale, Wakefield, Leeds and Kirklees.

West Yorkshire Metropolitan Ambul-ance Service will merge with Tees, East and North Yorkshire, and South Yorkshire to become Yorkshire Ambul-ance Services NHS Trust.

e-mail: claire.lomax @bradford.newsquest.co.uk

PCT SERVICES

The services which primary care trusts provide for patients are: doctors; dentists; opticians; pharmacies; school nursing; district nursing; health visiting; community hospitals; diagnostic and treatment centres; all community health services such as chiropody, dietetics and physiotherapy.