DOCTORS voted to save Salisbury’s specialist dementia care hospital in a crunch vote on Tuesday.

More than two thirds (71 per cent) of people who responded to a public consultation said they wanted to keep the 20 specialist beds in Salisbury.

As a result, Wiltshire Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) opted to keep the hospital at Amblescroft South in Fountain Way open.

The CCG had considered moving the unit to sites in Devizes or Trowbridge, but with the backing of Wiltshire Council it favoured keeping the facility as close as possible to Salisbury District Hospital.

Doctors say the decision will also save £440,000 in 2015/16 which will instead be invested in more services to support people in their homes or in care homes.

It also means the facility at Charter House, Trowbridge, will permanently close and the CCG now plans to sell it.

It ends a long-running saga that began in February 2013 when Charter House temporarily closed with £5.3million needed for its redevelopment.

Councillor John Walsh, who led the campaign against the Amblescroft South closure, welcomed the CCG’s decision.

He said: “The decision by the Wiltshire Clinical Commissioning Group to keep Fountains Way as the main location for dementia patients in Wiltshire is very welcome news for the many families whose loved ones will be facing this illness now and in the coming years.”

He added: “I am quite certain that the interest our community and the Salisbury Journal took in the consultation process helped the health professionals to come down in favour of Salisbury.”