As broken by OnTheWight back in September, details emerged about the future of Isle of Wight NHS services – with proposals for some health services moving to the mainland.
The new HIOW/STP Programme Office has issued the following release. Further analyses of the contents of the documents (embedded below) to followEd
Health and care plan for Hampshire and Isle of Wight will bring more care closer to patients
Local plans for improving health and care services across Hampshire and the Isle of Wight are the bedrock of a programme for transforming local health and care services and ensuring they remain sustainable in the future.
The plans have been developed over years of engagement across the area about how to achieve the changes that local people and clinicians have said they want.
As a result of these plans, patients in Hampshire and the Isle of Wight will benefit from more health and care services being provided closer to or in their homes over the next five years. They will have more choice about when and where to receive treatment, less travelling time to attend appointments and less time waiting for appointments, diagnostic tests and test results. They will also have more opportunities to be cared for at home and in the community rather than in a hospital setting.
Developed by all health and care organisations
The programme, which has been developed by all the health and care organisations across the area, also describes how the local NHS will implement a number of critical national programmes, including the Five Year Forward View for mental health and for general practice.
The plan does not replace or slow down local transformation programmes. Instead, organisations have come together to do the things that can only be achieved by working in partnership. For example, acute hospital NHS Trusts are building an alliance to improve outcomes for all residents while managing within the finances that will be available in the future.
£577 million budget gap
If NHS organisations across Hampshire and Isle of Wight do nothing to change the rising demand for services and the way they are provided, by 2020/21 there will be a gap of £577 million between the money received and what is needed.
This gap does not take account of the challenges that also face social care.
Working together also allows the local health and care system to better share best practice and to ensure co-ordination when local changes are made.
Five year plan
The plan covers a period of five years from 2016 to 2021 and, while there are some changes that can be made quickly, others will take longer to develop and require substantial engagement and, where appropriate, formal consultation with local people before they can be implemented, such as the future provision of acute services in north and mid Hampshire and how to ensure that people living on the Isle of Wight have sustainable hospital services.
Over the next weeks, each statutory organisation involved will receive the plan for discussion at their public Board meeting. The plan will also be discussed at meetings of the local health and wellbeing boards across the area.
Public engagement
Over the coming months, NHS organisations will engage fully with local people, predominately through the significant number of existing arrangements for engagement in place across Hampshire and the Isle of Wight.
If, after this engagement period, any proposal emerges that is considered to represent significant service change, there will also be a full consultation with local citizens and stakeholders.
The reports
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