As the public are being asked for their views on the controversial four-month night-time closure of Minehead’s minor injury unit, Dr Matt Hayman, deputy chief medical officer of the Somerset NHS Foundation Trust, tells the Free Press the reasons behind the decision - and looks to the future of the service.As the public are being asked for their views on the controversial four-month night-time closure of Minehead’s minor injury unit, Dr Matt Hayman, deputy chief medical officer of the Somerset NHS Foundation Trust, tells the Free Press the reasons behind the decision - and looks to the future of the service.

"AT the end of June we took the difficult decision to temporarily close the Minor Injury Unit (MIU) at Minehead Community Hospital overnight for four months from the beginning of July.

The MIU remains open from 8am-9pm seven days a week, 365 days a year but since we made this change we have heard concerns from local people about access to health services overnight when the MIU is temporarily closed.

We took this decision because we have concerns about the safety of the overnight MIU service in Minehead, the only MIU in Somerset open through the night. Speaking in my role as a doctor, it is vital that we take action when we have safety concerns about a service - which is what we are doing now.

In Somerset more than 100,000 people a year use MIU services which care for people with minor injuries or illnesses that are not life threatening. But in Minehead, over the last three years, an average of less than one patient was seen a night.Read the rest of Dr Hayman's comment in today's Free Press.