An innovative new service for treating people who self-harm is being piloted in Bradford.

A six-month project has started in GP surgeries and Eccleshill Community Hospital to treat people who self-harm, rather than in accident and emergency units.

Patients will be seen within six hours of calling a phone number by staff who have been trained to understand why people self-harm and who will treat their injuries in a non-judgemental way.

The 24-hour, seven-days-a-week service will initially be for people over 16 registered with a GP in North Bradford (Shipley, Baildon, Wrose, Eccleshill and Leylands surgery) but it is hoped that after evaluation it will be rolled out across the district.

The service, believed to be a UK first, has been developed by Dr Gillian Proctor, clinical psychologist with Bradford and Airedale Teaching Primary Care Trust's mental health team and Eleanor Longden, a psychology student and worker for the Early Interven-tion in Psychosis team, with support from Steph-anie Lawrence, nurse practitioner with the Comm-unity Intervention Team.

They have recruited a team of practice nurses, district nurses, nurse practitioners and GPs and the Community Intervention team who will provide the service out of hours.

Dr Proctor said: "Histori-cally, treatment for people who self-injure has been patchy or damaging. We're really hoping this new service will provide a very different kind of experience by letting them know their distress is cared about and deserves compassionate and understanding treatment."

Miss Longden said: "A common assumption is that the alternative to self-injury is acting normally'.

"On the contrary, the alternative is a loss of control and possibly suicide."

Currently, almost all people who self-harm are treated in hospital A&E units after lengthy waits.

It is estimated that nine out of ten self-harmers are women and usually the distress is a result of trauma, ranging from abuse as a child to domestic violence.

People can contact the team on (01274) 322647 at any time to be offered an appointment. A nurse will treat minor wounds or arrange treatment of more severe wounds at A&E, at a specified time to avoid long waits.

e-mail: claire.lomax@bradford.newsquest.co.uk