The traditional doctor’s surgery could soon be replaced by a new batch of "polyclinics", according to the health minister charged with reviewing the NHS.

If a trial of the new centres in London, which house GPs alongside other health professionals under the same roof, is successful they could become commonplace across the country.

Plans are being drawn up for at least 150 new centres across the capital alone. Many of the services to be offered are currently only available in hospitals.

They would include district nurses and rehabilitation teams working alongside GPs as well as “community matrons”, who provide sick or disabled elderly people out of hospital with care in their own homes.

Lord Darzi, who still works part-time as a surgeon, told the Breakfast programme on BBC1: “Most patients love their GP, but I think we need to support that fantastic relationship between a patient and a doctor.

“Most practices now are on average four, five or six GPs practising together under a single roof.

“I have no doubt in the future we are going to see a critical mass of general practitioners working together rather than what we used to see in the past, which were practices with a single-handed clinician.”

But the plans have come under heavy criticism from medical experts who claim clinics would waste millions of pounds and would be redundant in many rural communities.

Dr Richard Vautrey, deputy chairman of the British Medical Association’s GPs’ committee, said: “This is a government plan that is potentially going to waste hundreds of millions of pounds of scarce NHS resources, creating very large health centres that many areas of the country simply don’t need or want.

“The government is imposing this centralised plan on to everyone whether they need it or not," Dr Vautrey said.

“What is actually going to happen here with these proposals is large outside multinational private companies will be setting up in direct competition, because that is the way the government is actually going about tendering for these new health centres," he said.

“It is effectively going to be looking for the cheapest bidder" to run these health centres. The government is going to set up in competition directly with existing practices rather than supporting and developing them. What is going to happen is a duplication of services that won’t necessarily meet patients’ needs.

“One of the other chief concerns about the polyclinic plan is the way it will undermine the role of the generalised GP who can see any patient who walks through the door.

“One of Lord Darzi’s other plans is that these centres would have a greater degree of specialists — for childcare, for women’s problems. That actually starts to undermine the generalised role of the GP and means the GP can no longer see just about anyone who walks in the door and provide a holistic, generalised service that patients really value.”

Norman Lamb, the Liberal Democrat health spokesman, criticised the move saying the government was trying to impose a "one size fits all' policy on local communities.

He said: “There is a remarkable gap between the government’s rhetoric on local decision-making and its obsession with imposing models of care from the centre.

“Polyclinics might be a solution for some communities, but access to a doctor could become a nightmare, particularly in rural areas."

However, the Department of Health said it was not the end of small GP surgeries, many of which provide an excellent service to patients across the country.

"Health centres with more than one doctor and some specialists can deliver integrated and more convenient services for patients, and are already doing so in some areas.

“It is for local people and clinicians to decide what they want in their community ."

Explore Health News

• Swine flu

Times Recommends

• Shrinking violet Gordon turns into raging bull
• Eddie Izzard: 'I keep thinking if I do all these things she'll come back'
• Is sex for the disabled the last taboo?