Agenda item

The report provides a summary of the progress made in building INTs across BCP and how the programme is developing to reflect the emerging Neighbourhood Health agenda.

The Joint Chief Nursing Officer introduced the item and the Transformation Director and Chief Medical Officer, Dorset Healthcare presented a report, a copy of which had been circulated to each Member and a copy of which appears as Appendix 'D' to these Minutes in the Minute Book.

The government had emphasised the importance of this shift in its ambition for neighbourhood health services enabling people to live more years of healthy, active and independent life and improve their experience of health and care, whilst connecting together and making optimal use of health and care resource by:

•                Moving care from hospital to community, so that more people can be cared for at home, helping them to maintain their independence for as long as possible, only using hospitals when that was the best place for people to be.

•                Making better use of technology to support people to take better care of themselves, to improve treatment and diagnostics, and to provide seamless care across organisations.

•                Focussing on preventing illness with an increased focus on prevention and proactive care 

To realise this ambition health and care services need to:

•                Streamline access to care and advice for people who get ill or become in need but only use health and care services infrequently: providing them with much more choice about how they access care and ensuring that support was available in their community when they need it.

•                Provide more proactive, personalised care with support from a multidisciplinary team of professionals to people with more complex needs, including, but not limited to, those with multiple long-term conditions.

•                Help people to stay well for longer as part of a more ambitious and joined-up approach to prevention.

The approach was to develop Integrated Neighbourhood Teams (INTs).

Integrated Neighbourhood Teams would be responsible for working with their local communities to improve health and wellbeing outcomes, co-design sustainable and high-quality health and care provision and improve the quality of life for individuals across the community by increasing accessibility to services.

These teams would work together to provide joined-up services which work more efficiently and provide quicker access to the care and support that people need. Integrated Neighbourhood Teams would be the gel that keeps things together for people within our communities.

Work across partners was needed, with citizens and communities, to co-design local solutions and also to improve systems and processes to reduce the burden of administration for staff.

This would not be simple; it would take time to deliver the full extent of the ambition and get everything in place.

The first two years of the Integrated Neighbourhood Team programme was building the foundations for this way of working and supporting the development of Neighbourhood Health Services.

The report provided a summary of the progress made in building INTs across BCP and how the programme was developing to reflect the emerging Neighbourhood Health agenda.

The Committee discussed the report, including:

• In response to a query regarding links between neighbourhood health centres and recent government initiatives announced in the Autumn Statement, the Committee was advised that details on neighbourhood health hubs were unclear and any potential local allocations were unknown at this time.
• Community involvement was discussed, and it was highlighted that a co-production group was developing plans to integrate communities into neighbourhood leadership teams at a sustainable pace.
• Concerns were raised about repeating past initiatives and the need to learn from previous experiences.
• Dorset Healthcare highlighted differences from past efforts, citing the NHS 10-year plan’s stronger national commitment to neighbourhood-based care and improved, solid foundations to ensure success.
• In response to a query regarding how success and savings were going to be measured, it was highlighted that the programme aimed to deliver £6.3m cashable savings over two years, alongside productivity improvements.
• In response to a query, the Committee was advised that savings were tracked across eight areas, which included unplanned admissions, length of stay, emergency attendances, outpatient and elective referrals, prescribing, community equipment, and one additional category.
• The Committee was advised that forecasting used historic data to compare ‘do nothing’ scenarios with expected demand reductions which was monitored monthly via dashboards compiled by the Dorset Intelligence and Insight Service (DiiS).
• The Committee requested the programme DiiS dashboard be shared with them to consider further.  ACTION.

RESOLVED that the committee note the progress made on developing Integrated Neighbourhood Teams.

Voting: Nem Con.