The Healthy Partnerships Campaign, run by the Doctor Patient Partnership project, is beginning a campaign in shopping centres around England to stop people using primary care services unnecessarily.

The first stop will be Hastings in Sussex, followed by Blackpool and the Midlands.

The aim is to begin a wider campaign in the New Year.

GPs from out-of-hours co-operatives, local community health councils, charities like Age Concern, school nurses and health visitors will be on hand to give advice on ways of reducing trips to the doctor.

Christmas turkey

Shoppers will be given information on general health issues, out of hours services and how to live more healthily.

They will be told how to give up smoking and how to take their blood pressure as well as given advice on how to keep warm in the winter and how not to get injured when roasting the Christmas turkey.

The Doctor Patient Partnership (DPP) was set up by the British Medical Association and the government in 1996 to encourage more appropriate use of the NHS.

It was feared that excessive and unreasonable demand for healthcare was threatening to overwhelm primary care services.

The number of patients demanding to see their GPs outside daytime surgery hours has more than doubled in the past decade, according to Health Which? magazine, which has questioned the effectiveness of the DPP campaign.