A massive overhaul of support and treatment services for drug and alcohol addiction has been announced. Health reporter Dave Blackhurst examines the proposals

THE health trust running addiction support services in Stoke-on-Trent has been booted off the contract a year after an independent review found gaps in care.

NHS mental health trust, Combined Healthcare, and the charity Turning Point will no longer run drug and alcohol health services in the city after the PCT awarded the £2.23 million contract to national drug treatment agency, Crime Reduction Initiatives (CRI).

It comes after a Safer City Partnership review of services found wasteful duplication of effort, "inappropriate and ineffective care" and agencies working against each other.

Now, help for more than 2,000 addicts in Stoke-on-Trent is to be moved out of hospital to specialist clinics in the community.

The three existing drop-in clinics helping abusers – Druglink, in Hope Street, Hanley, plus others in Bentilee and Meir – will get extra staff and a fourth will open in Tunstall to serve the north of the city.

Numbers to be helped include 340 addicts now being treated as outpatients at Combined's Edward Myers Unit in the Harplands Psychiatric Hospital, Hartshill.

Their care will be switched to the clinics where three medical experts are being recruited to help them fight the addiction.

They will be supported by community psychiatric nurses and other drug workers, while existing GPs with special skills in the field will continue to see substance casualties.

Brighton-based CRI will also take over the running of the Lock Centre in Etruria, which was opened by Combined and Turning Point in 2004 as the UK's first unit specialising in treating teenagers.

As well as being available for longer hours including weekends, its emphasis will shift to doing more work with young victims of cannabis and alcohol abuse than with heroin casualties.

Combined has been left with just the £460,000 contract to continue to run the inpatient beds at Edward Myers – although it will retain a comprehensive service for addicts from Newcastle and the Staffordshire Moorlands whose care is funded by a different primary care trust (PCT) than Stoke-on-Trent.

Last year, Combined also lost a lucrative contract to counsel people with a mild to moderate mental health need, but its officials have refused to say whether the latest blow will lead to redundancies.

Combined Healthcare's nursing director, David Pearson said: "We are particularly disappointed given the extensive clinical expertise that has built up over the years to manage the complex health risk associated with serious substance misuse."

But Zafar Iqbal, the city's deputy director of public health, said: "Throughout this whole process we have put the needs of the patient first. This is a welcome development as substance and alcohol misuse is a real public health issue."

Ian Merrill, operations director of CRI said: "We are looking forward to playing our part in improving services for drug users in Stoke-on-Trent."