The out-of-hours service at Portree Hospital has been suspended again amid an ongoing staffing crisis.
At the weekend NHS Highland announced that the service at the Minor Injuries Unit/Urgent Care Centre at the Skye hospital would be temporarily suspended from 8pm on Saturday night.
The decision was made following ongoing recruitment issues impacting on patient safety, the health board said.
The Minor Injuries Unit reopened between 8am and 6pm yesterday and was then closed overnight until 8am today.
A spokesman for NHS Highland said: “NHS Highland would like to assure the public that this decision was not taken lightly. The management team exhausted all avenues to try and provide cover and will continue to take every possible action to maintain services and fill vacant shifts.
“There is no change to accessing emergency services and people should dial 999 if they experience a medical emergency and the Scottish Ambulance Service will respond as appropriate.
“When the Portree Unit is not open cover will be provided by the rural practitioner team based at the Dr MacKinnon Memorial Hospital in Broadford.”
The move follows a series of temporary out-of-hours suspensions during the Christmas period.
Last month it was announced that an external review will take place into healthcare provision in Skye, Lochaber and West Ross. The small team will be led by Sir Lewis Ritchie, who chaired a national review of NHS out-of-hours services in 2015.
A report on the findings, together with any recommendations, is expected to be produced by the end of April.
NHS Highland will then consider the report and take any appropriate action including reporting through the Highland Health and Social Care Partnership.
Skye-based Councillor John Finlayson said: “What everyone is asking, is when will we get a service that is not interrupted?
“We have all got ongoing concerns. I know it is not the only hospital in the Highlands with these problems, Caithness has got similar issues.
“The whole recruitment issue is a concern. NHS Highland had a recruitment fair in Portree last week looking to engage people to come forward.
“Members of the public are concerned that this is happening too often.”
