A £300,000 health watch scheme will not duplicate the work of the NHS and could save lives, insists Kent County Council.

Kent Health Watch was launched on Friday at Maidstone Hospital.

Council leader, Cllr Paul Carter (Con), said the idea for a health watch datedback four years but the scheme was given an added impetus by the publication of a critical report this time last year, into C-diff outbreaks at hospitals run by the Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells NHS Trust.

Callers to health watch will be answered by staff at County Hall’s contact centre and will be directed to the appropriate existing NHS service, such as the Patient Advice and Liaison Service, or NHS Direct.

It will also ensure all feedback about health and social care services in Kent is logged and the information used to improve services.

It is not a service to be used in an emergency.

NHS West Kent (the primary care trust) already has a complaints and feedback line and Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells NHS Trust is launching a patients’ council.

Later this year Kent LINks will launch, replacing Patients and Public Involvement Forums. The LINk group will monitor hospitals plus health and social care services across Kent.

Cllr Carter told the Kent Messenger: "Kent Health Watch is not duplicating the work of the NHS at all, in fact I think it will complement the complaints procedures.

"I think the current complaints procedures are highly complex and little understood by patients and relatives. This is simple. This will work. Could it save lives? Yes I think it could.

"Several years ago I think Kent Health Watch would have recorded a very atypical pattern about the treatments patients were receiving in Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells hospitals."

Steve Phoenix, chief executive of NHS West Kent, added: "This is an idea to add to what we are already doing and this is not a admission of failure by the NHS, but a sign it is willing to be flexible and adaptive."

KCC said the cost to taxpayers for Kent Health Watch would be 1p per family, per week.

Kent Healthwatch can be reached on 08458 247 103 or by email to kenthealthwatch@kent.gov.uk