Concerns have been raised over the future of a walk in centre in Accrington.

The walk in centre at Accrington Victoria hospital has been at the centre of a community campaign fronted by the Observer to keep the facility open.

Last month the Observer reported that the centre would be kept open until at least September 2016.

But the Patient Participation group (PPG) for the walk in centre and the GP surgery said they are worried about the long term future of the centre.

Patrick McGinley, who has campaigned tirelessly to keep the walk in centre open, said he believed the reason for the extension was as a result of a study being undertaken by the local clinical commissioning groups.

He said: “Their study is called a prioritisation study, which professes to ensure extremely wide public consultation.

“We are fearful the intention is to move the walk in centre to another location with GP’s being forced to share many of those patients or to close the walk in centre, or even worse, attempt to close the whole facility at Accrington Victoria hospital, including our very successful GP practice.

“We are the PPG for both the walk in centre and the GP practise and will fight strongly against any proposals to close or move any of these facilities.”

A spokesperson for NHS East Lancashire Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) said: “East Lancashire CCG has developed a draft policy to help clinical commissioners prioritise services that it would invest in, or in some cases that it may choose not to invest in. We will be engaging fully with the public towards the end of September for a period of three months, along with neighbouring NHS Blackburn with Darwen CCG. We are keen to receive views from patients and the public about this policy.

“The budget we receive is fixed and our funds are limited, and we therefore have a legal duty to balance the books and avoid incurring debts.

“This means that as clinical commissioners we need to make difficult choices about what services should be funded or not.

“The best way of making such choices in a fair and objective way is to have a policy and process that is open and transparent, and where we will carefully review every service and consider the clinical need, effectiveness and benefits to patients.”