HEALTH chiefs have applied for planning permission to create two £17m medical centres in Stanley town centre.

Derwentside Primary Care Trust (PCT) wants to demolish the Clifford Road building and replace it with a modern health centre.

It also wants to build an all- encompassing GP surgery on the site of the existing bus station.

Derwentside District Council is currently redeveloping Mary Street car park with a £4.2m environmentally-friendly interchange.

PCT chief executive Wynn Griffiths said: "The arrival of the two new buildings will aid the regeneration of the town centre in a physical way.

"It will also mean more people coming in to use the centres and they will also use the shops, so therefore it will have an economic impact."

Mr Griffiths said he hoped local construction firms would win the contracts for the building work, creating more jobs for tradesmen.

The centres will include all of the existing GP services as well as specialist services such as diabetes and dermatology.

Out-patients and X-ray services from South Moor Hospital will be transferred to the new centres. The child development centre at Annfield Plain will also be relocated to central Stanley.

Mr Griffiths said: "We want to provide treatment for patients that currently have to go to hospital in Stanley.

"They will have what they have got now, and more, in new accommodation."

"The purpose is to create space for the expansion of these services. Without the space, we will not be able to achieve this and we are trying to build for the future."

A public consultation is being carried out and ends on July 4.

Mr Griffiths said: "It is based on a shared vision from working with the public and medical professionals in Derwentside for the last 18 months.

"We are assuming that the public consultation will go smoothly and the feedback we have had is that we should get on with it."

Comments can be made on the proposals via the PCT website at www. derwentsidepct.nhs.uk People can also express views in writing to Wynn Griffiths, chief executive, Derwentside PCT, Shotley Bridge Community Hospital, Consett, County Durham DH8 0NB.