Violent patients across north Essex excluded from their GPs' practices will be coming to Maldon.

North Essex Health Authority (NEHA) has been searching for a site to send the aggressive patients to, and has decided on the town.

It is launching a scheme to tackle the patients' behaviour and the special surgery at St Peter's Hospital will specifically cater for the difficult residents.

The Maldon hospital will be the only surgery catering for them, although another two sites are provisionally planned for late next year in the west and north-east of the county.

The new unit will include a secure entry system to consultant rooms to protect staff and CCTV may also be on the cards.

Family Health Service Manager, Cathy Pedder, said the current list of nine patients included those who had threatened surgery staff.

"If a patient causes anyone, including the GP and staff, to feel threatened or vulnerable, then the police are informed," she said.

"The surgery asks the health authority to immediately remove the patient from their list to ensure the safety of the surgery."

But she said the health authority was still obliged to provide a service and needed to find another surgery which would take the ejected patient.

And it has now been decided these people will be sent to the unit in Maldon, possibly as early as January.

The scheme will work on an appointment-only system and the outbuilding at the hospital will be shared with Maldoc, a doctors co-operative for out-of-hours medical attention.

Only one GP, Mike North, has been pencilled in to run the project for managing the violent patients.

Converted for the new archive on 19 November 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.