Patients and councillors have pledged support to doctors fearing for their future amid planned changes to the dispensing of prescriptions.

More than 3,000 patients in west Oxfordshire have signed petitions calling on the Government to safeguard rural GP services.

And West Oxfordshire District Council has told the Government its plans to alter the prescription service would lead to surgery closures, job losses and reductions in patient care.

Doctors fear the plans to remove much of their prescription dispensing and hand it to local chemists would leave surgeries struggling to survive. They fear it could lead to the closure of Witney's Windrush Health Centre and affect the town's Deer Park Surgery, while also draining funding for surgeries in Chipping Norton, Charlbury, Burford, Bampton, Eynsham, Long Hanborough and Shipton-under-Wychwood.

Hilary Biles, cabinet member for leisure, health and tourism, said every surgery in the district had expressed fears about the proposals.

She added: "In rural areas such as west Oxfordshire, we need to keep our services local.

"On the one hand, we should not be alarmist. On the other hand, if we do not question the Government's White Paper now we will live to rue the day we did not take any action."

The Government is proposing to change the rules that currently allow surgeries to dispense to patients who do not have a commercial pharmacy within a mile-and-a-half of their home.

Instead they will have to stop all dispensing if there is a chemist within one mile of the surgery.

At a meeting of the full district council last Thursday councillors agreed to send Health Secretary Alan Johnson a letter stating their concerns, refer their fears to the Oxfordshire Joint Health Overview and Security Committee and raise the issue with Witney MP and Conservative leader David Cameron.

Patients are also being urged to write to the Government.

Dr David Nixon, of The Wychwoods Surgery, is a dispensing GP who fears the proposed changes will lead to a reduction in patient care.

He said: "We welcome the support, and hope it has an effect on the Government. The support from the patients has been fantastic.

"I certainly hope it will all have an effect.

"The Government won't listen to us - it will be a bigger effect if they receive letters from patients and councils."

The patients' group at the Windrush Heath Centre in Witney is holding an open meeting about the issue at the health centre from 10.30am on Saturday.