The decision of a third GP practice in the area to hand back their contact is “an extremely worrying situation” a special meeting of Fermanagh and Omagh District Council has been told.

The Department of Health confirmed GPs at Brookeborough and Tempo Practice have given notice of their intention to withdraw from their contract to deliver General Medical Services at the end of the notice period in six months’ time.

Councillor Sheamus Greene, Sinn Fein, who first revealed the issue, told members: “This is an extremely worrying situation for a lot of people in the area.

“There are around 9,000 patients, so it takes in a big catchment area – in fact, one of the biggest in Fermanagh.

“When I first heard the rumours I contacted the powers-that-be and asked for clarification, and to see if they had gone down every avenue to see if this GP surgery could be saved. As yet, I have had no reply.”

He proposed the Council: “Do the same as we did with Maple Healthcare and look for an urgent meeting with those who control this, including whoever the contact was handed back to.

“This needs to be done as soon as possible. As we’ve seen before, there can be all sorts of rumours, and a lot of people in that practice need clarity as soon as possible.”

A Department of Health spokesperson advised the process will now begin “to develop alternative arrangements for these services”.

They continued: “The Department wishes to reassure patients that the practice will continue to deliver GP services for the next six months.

“Patients do not need to take any action and should continue as normal.  The Department will be writing out to all practice patients to keep them informed.”

Meanwhile, the British Medical Association repeated the warning that GP practices are reaching “a point of no return”.

GP Committee Chair, Dr. Alan Stout, said: “As we have long predicted, practices and GPs in Northern Ireland are getting to a point of no return.

“The pressure and the lack of centralised support and planning is making general practice unsustainable.

“We have a huge workforce crisis, and while we have younger GPs coming in we are losing too many older GPs through retirement and burnout.

“We are also struggling to make being a partner an attractive career route.

“The problems are particularly acute in the West, where recruiting GPs is even harder, and the risks to other practices of list dispersals  are even more destabilising.

“We need to urgently resolve our workforce crisis  to ensure General Practice has a sustainable future.

“We need to address the indemnity issue, stabilise the workload and move away from the narrative that GPs are working ‘part-time’ or are closed to patients, when they are doing the very best they can to meet demand.”