THE performance of the NHS’ non-emergency phone line in Somerset has improved since a new provider took over, according to health professionals.

Devon Doctors took over the county’s NHS 111 service from Vocare in February 2019, nearly a year after the Care Quality Commission raised concerns about the standards of the service.

A report published ahead of a Somerset County Council meeting indicated the service had been struggling to hit its targets for answering calls within 60 seconds and transferring cases to the ambulance dispatch service.

But representatives from the Somerset Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) told the council’s adults and health scrutiny committee on Wednesday (March 13) that its performance had improved sharply since the end of 2018.

The report published ahead of the committee’s meeting in Taunton covers the period up to November 2018 – three months before Devon Doctors completely took over the service provision

In November, just over 72 per cent of calls to NHS 111 in Somerset were answered within 60 seconds, lower than the previous month and far below the target of 95 per cent.

The CCG predicted that performance would improve from December 2018 onwards, when an interim arrangement was put in place which saw Vocare and Devon Doctors each handle 50 per cent of the calls received.

Between October and November 2018, the level of calls being referred to the ambulance dispatch service rose from 10.93 per cent to 12.99 per cent.

Both months were above the ten per cent target for the service, but the CCG admitted that the levels “varied considerably” from month to month, rather than gradually increasing over a period of time.

Councillor Mandy Chilcott queried whether the amount of ambulances being dispatched had fallen since the report was written.

She said: “It says we’ve had ambulance dispatches increased. Are you finding that figure is reduced, since it’s a fairly out of date figure?”

Michelle Skillings, the CCG’s head of performance, responded: “Since the new provider came on board on February 25, we’ve seen a fall in that number.

“We’ve certainly seen an improvement in 60 second calls since the new providers came on board, and it’s a very closely monitored service.”

Deborah Rigby, the CCG’s deputy director of quality and safety, assured the committee that Devon Doctors had been very responsive to feedback about its handling of the service.

She said: “If you’ve had a performance review meeting with Vocare and a performance review meeting with Devon Doctors, it is about as opposite as you can get.”

She added they were in discussion with Devon Doctors about changing its name, to prevent people from being confused by voicemail messages.