BLACKBURN and Darwen residents have been asked to cancel their doctor appointments if they are unable to attend them.

On average, more than 3,000 appointments are being missed in GP surgeries in the borough every month.

In order to help bring the numbers down, Blackburn with Darwen Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) have launched a campaign to highlight the problem of patients failing to make their appointments.

Called ‘Keep it or Cancel it’, the campaign is aimed at raising awareness of the need to cancel unwanted appointments, even if it is up to 10 minutes beforehand, so the practice can offer the slot to someone else.

The ‘Did Not Attend’ appointments have an enormous impact on the health economy and costs the NHS millions of pounds, wastes doctors’ and nurses’ time and deprives other patients of an appointment.

Some practices regularly have up to 20 per cent of appointments missed, which is equivalent to around one day a week of a GP's time.

Dr Pervez Muzaffar, communication and engagement lead for Blackburn with Darwen CCG and a local GP, said: “The number of wasted appointments in local surgeries across Blackburn with Darwen is huge; it’s a massive waste of precious resources and time.

“The NHS is ours and we can all play our part to improve it the system.

“The campaign is aimed at encouraging people to remember to attend their appointment or if you don’t need it any more, then please cancel it. “These GP or practice nurse appointments can be offered to other patients who need them urgently.

“It will improve the waiting time as well as decreasing the number of inappropriate A&E attendances.”

The majority of patients just simply forget they have an appointment booked but there are other reasons for patients failing to attend appointments, including feeling better, transportation problems or being unable to get through to the surgery to cancel.

Dr Muzaffar said: “There are always people waiting for appointments or emergency slots on the day so please do cancel the appointment if you do not need it. “It doesn’t matter if it is only 10 minutes beforehand, we will always be able to find someone to fill the appointment."

“We would rather you cancelled it than did not attend.”

People who wish to find out if their GP offers a text service should enquire at the practice.