Croydon's minor injuries units are to be replaced with GP-led "hubs" 365 days a year and for longer hours.

 Croydon Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG), which had been reviewing, the future of urgent care in the borough, this week committed to three hubs at Parkway Health Centre in New Addington, Purley War Memorial Hospital and Edridge Road walk-in centre.

In 2014 the CCG halved Purley hospital's GP-led urgent care centre opening hours from 12 to six a day, just months after the hospital a £11.5m refurbishment.

It meant the centre only opens from 2pm to 8pm each day, but once the new plans are rolled out in April 2017 it will open at 8am.

In September a coalition of residents’ associations wrote to Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt imploring him to intervene amid claims Purley War Memorial Hospital's downgraded urgent care centre could be closed altogether.

Riddlesdown Residents' Association (RRA) vice chairman Chris Stanley, who was part of the group that wrote to the health secretary, said: “The good news is it will be 8am to 8pm and it will be able to cover minor ailments, the bad news is that it is not a fully-fledged urgent care centre that has x-ray facilities to diagnose fractures or other injuries.

“We are pleased that there is going to be something there because at one point that was in doubt.

“It is not the full extent of what we wanted but it will be a facility, the devil is going to be in the detail and it depends on how this actually comes back once the procurement process has gone through.”

Croydon South MP Chris Philp, who lobbied the CCG over its decision to cut down the hours at Purley hospital, said: “Going forward, I will continue keep up the pressure on the CCG to make sure the hub at Purley is as good as possible.”

Patients needing urgent care will still need to travel to Croydon University Hospital for treatment.

The urgent care centre and out-of-hours service in Croydon hospital’s emergency department will continue under the plans.

Dr Agnelo Fernandes, Croydon CCG assistant clinical chair said:  “We would like to thank everyone who gave up their time and joined in with our urgent care review.

“Your suggestions have had real, direct, impact on this decision about what urgent care will look like.

“The model that has resulted is an exciting new direction for Croydon. We look forward to working with local residents to refine the specifications and select the best possible new provider for these services.”