Community Nursing and Health Visitors

Community Nursing for the Orkney Mainland is provided from the The Balfour, Kirkwall as well as the Stromness, Dounby, and South Ronaldsay Surgeries.

All of the island GP Practices have either Nurse Practitioners or Community Nurses based within the Practice. Of these islands North Ronaldsay, Papa Westray, Flotta, Shapinsay, Eday and Rousay have no resident GP.

Health Visiting is mainly provided from the mainland with the staff "adopting" islands and visiting them as necessary. Midwifery and Community Psychiatric Nursing are also provided in this way. However, the frequency of these visits depends on the needs of the caseloads.

Within Community Nursing, we have a number of peripatetic Specialist Nurses:

• Diabetic Specialist Nurse
• Specialist School Nurses

The School Nurses and Health Visitors are part of the Children's Services Department and do not operate an emergency callout system over 24 hours, but all other staff can be contacted via pager by contacting The Balfour Switchboard.  Although based in Kirkwall, the School Nursing Department covers all schools in Orkney.

Referral to the Community Nurses is welcome from any source.