RE the proposed closure of the Gilwern Doctors Surgery. I live in Clydach and have been registered with the doctors in Gilwern Surgery for all of my life (61 years).

if it closes and the only alternative is to go to the main surgery at Crickhowell. This means I will have to get a bus from Clydach (78) to Abergavenny and then wait for a 43/x43 bus to take me from Abergavenny to Crickhowell for any appointment I may have as I don’t drive.

This journey could take two hours or more in total and then I would have to do the same to get home.

On hearing of this potential closure, I made enquiries with the Tudor Gate and Old Station Surgeries in Abergavenny to register as a patient, only to be told that after they consulted their list provided by the Local Health Authority of locations in the vicinity from which, they can accept new patients, that this was not possible for me as mine was not on the list of acceptable locations.

My postcode is in Monmouthshire and there were lots of other locations on the list though I can’t recall them.

The nonsense is that I live in Monmouthshire but can’t enrol with a doctor in Abergavenny as the Gilwern surgery that may close, though in Monmouthshire, is a sub branch of a Powys surgery in Crickhowell.

Gilwern is not in Powys though Health Authority bureaucracy as far as doctors is concerned suggests that it is.

Despite this I’d like to wish a long and happy retirement to the doctors at Gilwern who have given loyal and dedicated service to their Gilwern patients.