MATRONS are set to make a come-back to the NHS in Swindon, the Government revealed today.

Under a health service shake-up, 10 community matrons will be drafted into the town's clinics.

They will be charged with getting fast help to the vulnerable and elderly spotting problems at an early stage.

Health chiefs say the move will benefit patients and the NHS by stopping unnecessary hospital visits.

That should free up beds for more operations while letting people with long-term illness get treatment at their local practice.

The project, already tested in parts of the country, has been hailed as a success by NHS bosses.

Health Minister John Hutton vowed the 3,000 new matrons nationwide would help revolutionise the health service.

He said: "We will be training up and recruiting very specialised, very skilled community matrons. It is a big change of direction for primary care."

The programme was unveiled today in an NHS command paper a health service master plan for the next four years. It included a new waiting time promise that by 2008 it will take 18 weeks from seeing a GP to having an operation. It also promised new mobile cancer scanners to be rolled out across the nation by July, speeding up treatment, and NHS managers were warned patients will be free to go to any hospital by 2008, if they feel they will get better treatment than in their own area.