NHS sets out its ‘vision’ for health services
18/08/2006
Health chiefs will today explain to the County Council’s Health Overview and Scrutiny Committee that change is unavoidable if the NHS locally is to achieve financial balance and protect the quality and range of services provided in to the future.
Presentations from managers and clinicians will show that due to advances in new technology, drug treatments and medical practice, many more patients are experiencing shorter hospital stays or are receiving care outside of hospital in their local community.
The local Health Community maintains that current proposals will help divert resources resulting in the expansion of community based services and achieving better value for every pound spent.
Expanded community services will include more treatment at home, more outpatients seen locally, more rehabilitation and intermediate care services provided within localities and more treatment in GP surgeries. Specialist inpatient hospital services will still be available when patients need them.
For some patients this would mean that they receive services in a different place such as a new facility, in their own home or in a local clinic, but the NHS is committed to maintaining the quality of care and treatment provided in all settings.
The NHS will point to schemes already in place which reflect the way services are already developing – reducing the need for hospital stays and supporting patients to get back home from hospital more quickly.
These include development of emergency care practitioners who can provide basic medical care in the patient’s home or at the scene of an accident and community based nurses helping to support patients with heart failure, diabetes and other long term conditions in the patient’s home or at a local clinic.
Chief Executive of Cheltenham and Tewkesbury Primary Care Trust, Caroline Fowles who is leading the consultation said:
“The decisions we ultimately make need to reflect these changes and so far consultation feedback shows that the majority of people responding believe we have used the right principles in developing our proposals including minimising duplication of services, reducing spending on premises before reducing numbers of staff and providing care at home and in local settings where it is sensible to do so.”
“We will however listen very carefully to what people are telling us as part of the consultation and work with out communities to consider their ideas, suggestions and any alternative schemes that could be right for the future as well as affordable.”
