A PEEBLES doctors’ receptionist has answered her final call after serving 30 years with the NHS.

Seventy-year-old Wilma Nicholson was a well-known voice and face at Haylodge Health Centre, which serves the Peebles community.

Wilma was the surgery’s longest serving receptionist, after joining the team part-time when she was 40 and her children were still at school.

It wasn’t long before Wilma, who lives in Eddleston, was promoted to senior receptionist and she has seen many changes from the days when she first started on the medical reception team.

Before advanced technology took over, Wilma would record appointments in a booking diary, handwrite medical notes and prescriptions and pick up the telephone by hand.

Wilma soon adapted to the modern-style changes, learning to book appointments on the computer and speaking to patients through a headset.

And before the days of NHS 24, Wilma remembers switching the phones over to the home of the doctor on call.

After hanging up her headset for the very last time, Wilma told the Peeblesshire News she is now looking forward to enjoying her retirement. “I was determined not to retire until I had completed 30 years, that was my goal,” she explained. “Over the years as the town grew, the surgery got busier and busier. It was a busy and at times stressful job but I absolutely loved it.”

The former receptionist said conversations with colleagues were few and far between. “You’d start a conversation at quarter to nine and it would be five o’clock before you finished it.”

And if Wilma ever needed medical attention herself, she was in the right place – although never one to complain, she hobbled into work one day suspecting she had merely sprained her ankle, when in fact it was broken.

Asked what she would miss the most about working behind the glass at the busy health centre, Wilma said: “I’ll miss helping people that were sick and in need. I really felt appreciated offering people who were unwell an appointment with the doctor. I will of course miss the companionship and the busyness of the day.”

Dr Tim Young said: “We congratulate Wilma on achieving 30 years of service to the GPs and our community, and will miss her. She has seen a great many changes over the years and has a wealth of knowledge and experience. On behalf of everyone at the health centre, I would like to thank her for all her hard work and wish her well for a well-deserved retirement.”

Wilma has plenty to keep her busy, as a member of her local Scottish Women’s Institute and village choir, Eddleston Voices.

And she is very much looking forward to a spot of gardening and putting her feet up to read a book in peace.