HWNL-April-May-web

Update from Jan Sensier – Chief Executive
There is a lot happening in the health world in particular at the moment. In May, we saw the
commencement of the Improving Lives programme in East Staffordshire. This programme has
been set up by the Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) to create better and more joined up
care for adults in the area, and is being delivered through a contract with Virgin Healthcare.
Charles Pidsley, Clinical Chair of East Staffs CCG, attended our Board meeting in public on 25
May to update us on progress, explaining that for the first few months the focus is on the safe
transition of services, but some innovations have already been brought in such as the work
with Age UK to use Care Navigators to help patients access a wider range of services including
from the voluntary sector. As a GP, Charles said he has already seen startling results for some
of his patients as a result of this work. Full details on the programme can be found here -
http://eaststaffsccg.nhs.uk/improving-lives.
At our Board meeting, we also saw a presentation from Burton NHS Foundation Trust (FT),
explaining their plans working closely with Derby Teaching Hospitals NHS FT to address
better patient pathways and the financial gaps. We have agreed with the Trust that we will
work with them to set up a patient reference group to support this work, and we are working
with Healthwatch Derby and Healthwatch Derbyshire to take this forward.
It will be really important for this work to be seen in the wider Staffordshire context. The NHS
in all parts of the country are now required to produce a Sustainability and Transformation
Plan, outlining how organisations will work together as a system to develop a place based plan
which is ambitious about transformation and covers the breadth of the agenda from
prevention and self-care, workforce through to new models of care and finance. For our area,
the “footprint” for this plan is Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent and Healthwatch Staffordshire
has a seat on the overall Programme Board, giving us a real chance to ensure that priority
is given to public and patient engagement, although the time-scales for producing the plans
makes this challenging. For Staffordshire, a key issue will be the extent of the financial
deficits across both commissioners and providers in the system, and how these can be
addressed in a way that leads to better joined up services and patient care. Both Staffordshire
County Council and Stoke-on-Trent City Council are also partners in this programme and it will
be really important that local authority social care and public health responsibilities are taken
into account in formulating these plans.
Finally, many of you will be aware that there has been a public consultation on the future of
Healthwatch Staffordshire. Engaging Communities Staffordshire has been delivering this
service since April 2013, and our contract will be up for renewal later this year. Staffordshire
County Council and Stoke-on-Trent City Council have been consulting on whether there should
be one service or two for the two local areas, and also whether Healthwatch should be
delivered alongside NHS Complaints Advocacy. The ECS Board is very supportive of joining up
the services both geographically and across Healthwatch and Complaints Advocacy and their
response to the consultation can be seen here - http://bit.ly/1sYuhCs. The consultation
period has now closed, and we understand that a decision on the future of the service will be
made later this summer.
Continued on next page...
2