HEALTH service improvements in Darlington are being kept on ice for the next 12 months because of a lack of NHS cash.

This week the chief executive of the newly-formed primary care trust warned that far-reaching changes to GP and community nursing services would not happen this year despite Government promises over NHS cash increases.

On hold will be the pioneering initiative to free up GP appointments using nurses to assess and treat selected patients and a scheme to carry out minor surgical procedures in doctors' surgeries.

In fact, no new money to develop and deliver service improvements would be expected until April 2003.

However, once the extra £6m promised was received, Colin Morris, chief executive of Darlington PCT, claimed people could expect to see some big changes in the way health issues were tackled.

"The Government has pinned its colours to the mast by making the NHS the number one priority," he told the D&S Times. "It will either make or break it.

"We have massive deficiencies everywhere and the Government is trying to put right over 20 years of non-investment.

"However, we know that the extra money we need to begin implementing far-reaching local changes will not come until next April.

"This is frustrating for us all. We are anxious to fully develop GP and community nursing services so that more work can be carried out in primary care than in hospitals and so relieve waiting times. We also need to expand health promotion services. But without the money, it is not possible."

PCTs are responsible for identifying local health needs and providing the services to meet those needs whether by hospital, GP, dental, community nursing, specialist or mental health services.

Next year the PCT budget will be £86m.

"Even if vast amounts of money poured into the NHS there would not be the people in place to do the work. Health improvement is the way forward. Smokers and people who are overweight will pose the biggest problems for health services in the future," Mr Morris added.

"We must educate people to look after themselves and not take health for granted."

From next April, the PCT will develop and expand health promotion, nurse-led patient assessments, nurse prescribing, minor surgical procedures in GP surgery's and guaranteed maximum 48-hour waits for GP appointments