NHS Isle of Wight CCG – the body with overall responsibility for improving the health of Islanders – has published its five year strategy for healthcare 2014 to 2019.
Speaking at a meeting of the Governing Body of the Isle of Wight Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) held at Newport Parish Hall where the strategy was approved, Helen Shields, Chief Officer said:
“This strategy sets out what we need to do to achieve high quality integrated and sustainable healthcare, and deliver our contribution to the Island’s Five Year Health and Social Care Vision.
Article continues below this advertisement “It reflects the priorities of our members (the Isle of Wight GP practices), our health and social care partners, the third sector, our patients and the general public. It highlights the areas where we are doing well, as well as areas for improvement. The conclusion is a set of priorities that will improve the health and social care outcomes for the people of the Isle of Wight while living within the resources that are available.”
The priorities identified in the strategy are to:
- Increase people’s ability toself-care and self-manage their illness or condition. We will focus on supporting people to stay healthy, make information and guidance easily available and use assistive technology (such as tele-health) more effectively.
- Develop moreintegrated care delivered closer to people’s homes. We will develop care planning for vulnerable people, and enable people to stay in their own homes by wrapping services around patients.
- Improve access to urgent care through an urgent care coordination centre, improving crisis response services in the community and providing GPs with alternatives to hospital admission for people who need care but do not need hospital.
- Increase capacity and capability in primary care, supporting primary care to develop collaborative approaches to delivering services, develop workforce and reform the delivery of urgent primary care.
- Improve people’s mental health through programmes to reduce stigma, improve prevention and early intervention, and improve rehabilitation. The CCG will be implementing a suicide prevention strategy and working with Child an Adolescent Mental Health services to improve services.
- Improve services provided to children, including improving safeguarding of Islanders.
CCG Chair, Dr John Rivers, said:
“We face an unprecedented challenge: we have to ensure we can support increased demand with more limited resources. By working together with our colleagues in the Isle of Wight Council, Isle of Wight NHS Trust, primary care and the third and independent sectors, and by consulting with the public we have created a vision for the future that will enable us to transform our services to meet this demand. Our success will be measured on the delivery of this service change and improved health and care outcomes for our Island population.”
Karen Baker, Chief Executive Officer at Isle of Wight NHS Trust, one of the major suppliers of health services to Islanders added:
“This strategy demonstrates a clear direction of travel for Island health services and underpins the shared vision we have with the CCG and the Isle of Wight Council for the development of health and social care on the Island.”
Further information about meetings and the agenda and papers are available on the CCG website at https://www.isleofwightccg.nhs.uk/about-us/our%20governing%20body/board-papers/board-papers.htm.
