Further major disruption caused by industrial action over the next fortnight will again have a serious impact on the NHS, with services expected to face another challenging period.
To ensure care continues to be available for those in life-threatening situations, NHS staff will again prioritise emergency and urgent care – with many routine appointments and procedures for patients being postponed each day.
Junior doctors will strike from 11th – 15th August and this will be followed by a second walk-out by consultants on 24th and 25th August.
People who need NHS care should use services as they usually would – 999 or A&E in a life-threatening emergency and NHS 111 online for other health concerns.
Patients with appointments who haven’t been contacted otherwise should attend as normal and community services such as GPs and pharmacies are also largely unaffected by the strike.
Clair Raybould, Director of System Delivery, NHS Lincolnshire ICB, said:
“We are once again entering an exceptionally busy and disruptive period for the NHS, starting with the junior doctors strike from 11th August.
“However, our staff continue to work extremely hard to provide patients with the care they need, although this latest strike will likely impact a significant amount of hospital appointments around the country, including in Lincolnshire.
“As with previous strikes we want to be very clear that anyone with a life threatening medical issue should still call 999 – in all cases priority will be given to those with the most medically urgent needs.
“However, at the same time, we also need to remind people who need help with a non-life threatening medical issue to make use of the alternative sources of help and advice available, such as NHS 111 online.
“In addition, you can call 111 and, of course, GP practices and local pharmacies are open and able to offer advice and help. In Lincolnshire we also have the Waitless App, which can be downloaded and enables you to view live waiting time, queue numbers and travel time information for our urgent care facilities in the county.”