Agenda item

The Assistant Director Strategy, Procurement and Finance will report at the meeting.  Presentation attached.

Julie Gonda, Assistant Director Strategy procurement and Finance, attended the meeting to provide members of the Committee with an update in respect of the Healthier Radcliffe programme.  The presentation contained the following information:

The Healthier Radcliffe schemes were rolled over in November 2015 to 31 March 2016 this was to allow for a more detailed evaluation and review extended data to understand the real value of the schemes.

A decision will be made by Integrated Health & Social Care Board which is being held on 17 March 2016.  Of the 4 schemes, it is proposed that 2 are decommissioned; Domiciliary Medication Optimisation and the Frail Multi Disciplinary Team (MDT) and Targeted Frail Elderly Care Co-ordination.

It is proposed to continue with the Radcliffe & Whitefield Paramedic scheme and the Staying Well service, but to roll it out across Bury with the systematic identification of appropriate patients in place

The Assistant Director Strategy Procurement and Finance reported that learning from the healthier Radcliffe scheme has identified a number of themes including:

·         more focus is need to consider evaluation up front, what we think is ‘good’ and how we measure it, before schemes or services are put in place

•       Engagement with, and from, partners and GPs needs to be undertaken differently and much earlier in design

•      A different approach is needed rather than the piecemeal approach to schemes, and separate project management has not been as effective as it could have been

•      An out of hospital approach / model should be defined that we can commission as one ‘out of hospital’ service

The Chair invited questions from those present and the following points were raised.

In response to a Member’s question the Assistant Director Strategy Procurement and Finance reported that 400 reviews were requested in respect of the domiciliary medication optimisation scheme.  In respect of the frail MDT scheme 289 service users were identified of those 98 completed the assessment. 

In response to concerns raised by Members, the Assistant Director reported that some of the issues that have led to the services not being recommissioned will be successfully addressed via pooled budgets and the better care fund.  The Better Care Fund will allow for greater integration of services and will alleviate some of the problems that have arisen in respect of the recruitment and the retention of staff. 

With regards to the decommissioning of the multi disciplinary team, the Assistant Director reported that this is not about how care is delivered but rather the professionals that support the service and the assessment process. 

In response to a question from the Chair, the Assistant Director reported that liaison and engagement with GPs could have been better.  A GP engagement event has recently taken place in respect of working with the primary care workforce which has provided some learning as to how to engage differently.

With regards to the planned extension of the rapid response vehicles, partners are in negotiation with Northwest ambulance service in respect of providing additional resources.

It was agreed:

The Assistant Director, Strategy procurement and Finance and be thanked for their attendance.