London is today at the centre of changes in healthcare that aim to radically alter the traditional doctor/patient relationship and help people with long-term medical conditions take control of their lives.
This is being done through The Health Foundation’s £5 million Co-creating Health initiative which is being launched today in Hammersmith. It aims to create better partnerships between patients, doctors and nurses and give patients more control over their condition.
Health services in Islington and Haringey, Southwark and Wandsworth are leading the way for the capital. These services will centre around three sites at Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust, The Whittington NHS Trust and South West London and St George's Mental Health NHS Trust. Only five other sites nationwide have been chosen to run this initiative.
Natalie Grazin, Assistant Director at The Health Foundation, said:
“If you have diabetes, or another a long-term condition, everything you do affects your condition and your quality of life. Co-creating Health aims to work with patients to understand how to change their lives for the better and manage their condition.
“We want to change attitudes so that patients no longer think that it’s just the Doctor’s job to improve their health. We need to find better ways for doctors, nurses and patients to work together to improve patients’ lives.
“Co-creating Health aims to meet this challenge through training that gives patients the knowledge to make important lifestyle changes and doctors and nurses the skills to support patients better – in their own home, at their GPs and in hospital.”
Anna Reid, Nurse Consultant for Diabetes at Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust hospital, also commented:
“When you consider that patients with long-term conditions only see a health professional for several hours each year, then they really need to have the ability to make informed choices about their own health in a way that’s relevant for them.”
Kate Saxton lives with depression and is involved in the project at South West London and St George's Mental Health NHS Trust. She said:
“This project is an excellent innovation. It encourages people to take charge of their own care. People with long-term conditions have a substantial knowledge of their own? condition and it is important that clinicians draw on this expertise to help their patients achieve better recovery.”
Felicity Singh has diabetes and supported the selection process at The Whittington Hospital. She talked about why Co-creating Health is important to her:
“Co-creating Health will give me knowledge and understanding to take more responsibility for my condition. I think that by doing this my quality of life and my health will benefit.”
Paul Corrigan, Director of Strategy and Commissioning at the London Strategic Health Authority said:
“Involving patients in their own health care is not only a decent way to treat them but it improves the medical efficacy of treatment. Helping more people choose health and improving the NHS all depends upon the public and patients understanding the relationship between their own minds and bodies and the treatment medical staff want to prescribe. A world city such as London is famous for the diversity of its population - better medicine needs these different communities to play a fuller role in helping medical staff to work with them to improve their health.”
Notes to editors
Co-Creating Health
Over 17 million people in the UK are currently living with a long-term condition. By 2030, this number is expected to double. This scenario not only presents a huge challenge to society, but also to our current health system.
The Health Foundation is investing £4.95 million in this initiative over three years, from August 2007 to July 2010. Eight teams from across the UK will be taking part, two teams will focus on each of the following long-term conditions:
• Musculoskeletal pain
• Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease
• Diabetes
• Depression
Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust, The Whittington NHS Trust will focus on diabetes, South West London and St George's Mental Health NHS Trust will partner with Devon Partnership NHS Trust and Torbay Care Trust to focus on depression.
Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust
Guy's and St Thomas' provides ¾ million patient contacts in acute and specialist hospital services every year. As one of the biggest NHS Trusts in the UK, it employs over 9,000 staff. The Trust also works in partnership with the Schools of Medicine, Dentistry, Nursing and Biomedical Sciences of King's College London and other Higher Education Institutes to deliver high quality education and research. The trust works in partnership with the local community with Lambeth and Southwark Primary care trust
South West London and St George's Mental Health NHS Trust
The Trust serves a local population of about one million people across five boroughs. Local communities are culturally very diverse, with each borough having its own ethnic mix, some long established and some very new. The Trust provides a modern, comprehensive local mental health and social care service to the residents of our boroughs, operating from 100 sites. These include services for adults, older people, children and adolescents. The Trust cares for approximately 18,000 patients, some in the community, some at home. There are 750 beds in total and 30 Community Mental Health Teams. The Trust had 3,831 inpatient admissions in the year 2006/07.
The Whittington NHS Trust
The Whittington Hospital is an award winning acute general teaching hospital based in Islington, North London, serving a catchment population of 300,000, with a workforce of 2,412 staff. It values its relationship with the local community and local Primary Care Trusts. It is based within a widely diverse community, both in terms of ethnicity and socio-economic mix, and the trust has a well-regarded reputation for responding to the specific needs of its local patients as reflected in the range of services it provides. The trust’s vision is to be “the hospital of choice for local people” and has a special focus on day treatment and one stop care, maternity and neonatal services, and the management of long term conditions in partnership with primary and community providers. The trust has recently opened its new building with the latest state of the art imaging unit, ITU/coronary care unit and wards; with a day treatment centre due to open