TEN years after the idea was originally mooted, a new £4 million super surgery for Tewkesbury is on the verge of becoming a reality.
Doctors from the town's three surgeries aim to move into a new building that will be created on the site of the existing hospital, in Barton Road. It is being replaced with a new £10million hospital next door.
The GPs intend to move the project forward next month by submitting a planning application to the borough council for their development.
If approved, GPs from the Church Street, Jesmond House and Watledge practices plan building work to start in July of next year. They then hope to have it up and running in late 2014.
Doctors said the new site, which will be paid for by the NHS, would give them twice as much space as they had in their extremely restricted sites at the moment.
Dr Sanjay Shyamapant, of the Church Street practice, said staff and patients supported the move.
He said: "It will be fantastic for the patients and the doctors.
"As an area, Tewkesbury has lagged behind. Places nearby in Worcestershire, such as Upton, Pershore and Malvern, have all got new doctors' centres."
The proposal is for a three-storey building, with a courtyard in the middle. There would be a pharmacy on the site and between 70 and 80 spaces in a car park the super surgery would share with the new hospital, which is now being built opposite.
Patients are being reassured that the surgeries will remain separate from each other.
Dr Shyamapant added that the development was excellent news for health care in Tewkesbury and most patients seemed to appreciate that.
He said: "I think most are thankful that something is happening.
"Like a lot of things in Tewkesbury, it takes a long time to come to fruition.
"Most people understand the present provision is inadequate." The super surgery, which is formally being called the Tewkesbury Primary Care Centre, will be built with the potential to expand, should large numbers of houses be built in the Tewkesbury area.
Doctors have factored in the likelihood that the population will grow in the next few years and so the new building will be built to cope with 30,000 patients, as opposed to the current level of 24,000.
The surgeries will have access to a minor operations theatre, a facility they have not got at the moment.
They will display the plans at a public exhibition in the Watson Hall on November 28, from 1pm to 4pm.
Updated information will also soon be available at www.tewkesburysurgeries.org.
