Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust is an NHS foundation trust which provides hospital and community health services in North Tyneside and hospital, community health and adult social care services in Northumberland.

The A&E units at Hexham, Wansbeck and North Tyneside hospitals have been downgraded,[7] and in December 2016 the opening times were reduced to 16 hours a day, in order to release staff for Cramlington where there are many more patients arriving at night.

The intention was to achieve VAT benefits, as well as pay bill savings, by recruiting new staff on less expensive non-NHS contracts.

It is run by local GPs and provides practice management including quality monitoring, governance and compliance, payroll, financial services, HR and estates maintenance for practices, initially Ponteland Medical Group with 11,000 patients, and Collingwood Medical Group in Blyth which serves 5,000 patients.

Nurse practitioners, clinical pharmacists, prescribing physiotherapists and specialist women's health doctors had been introduced into the practices.