Jo Yeaman, Director of Marketing, Communications, and Patient & Public Involvement, will give a presentation update on the Next Stage Review.
Minutes:
Jo Yeaman, Lead Director for Consultation, Next Stage Review Programme attended the meeting and gave an update on the Next Stage Review.
Jo announced that she would be providing a verbal update because the review was still work in progress and data was still being collated that had been collected over the last few months. There were three phases to the review, the first phase was Engagement.
There was to be an independent report conducted by De Montfort University on the engagement programme and this would be available in the next 2-3 weeks. Jo stated that the report would be made available when it was made public. 4,000 responses had been received from individuals and patient and public representatives across Leicestershire, Leicester and Rutland, which was one of the best responses from a public consultation on this scale. Of the responses 40% had been received from Black and Minority Ethnic groups. This was particularly pleasing, as greater efforts had been made to engage that community. The gender splits in the results were 51% male and 49% female. Jo informed the Committee that there was excellent engagement from older people and while there was good engagement with younger people there were areas for improvement. The Committee was informed that a lot of lessons had been learnt from the consultation as nothing had been done before on this scale in Leicestershire, Leicester and Rutland. Due to the engagement 1,200 community groups had now been listed on the central database and the contacts for the groups had been checked. Jo also stated that direct mailing had been extremely effective, as had the discussion day events that had been held, however the bus adverts and the media coverage to attract people had been less effective but although these methods did not generate many responses they had raised awareness of the review.
The next scheduled phase was entitled Delivery of Promise. Jo announced that at the next meeting of the Committee there would be a detailed presentation on this phase. The Thrombolysis treatment would be available 24/7 from mid March 2009. The Committee were informed that a 24/7 stroke service was being worked towards and the mini strokes pathway had been redesigned. This would mean that patients who had suffered suspected mini strokes would now be seen within 48 hours from the time they had been referred from their GP, this was a change on the previous time, which was around 2 weeks or more. Jo stated that it was important that a person who had suffered a mini stroke was assessed immediately as there was a high risk of suffering a full stroke. The urgent care centre would now be open to patients without appointments. Jo commented that there would be 2 new GP practices to be built in the city and contracts appointed. The health centre in Charnwood would open in January 2009 and there were further developments planned in the next 2-3 years. The Committee were informed that Leicester City was on course to hit its extended GP hours target which was to have 50% of practices running at extended hours by December. Leicester City was currently at 45%. There would be investment in the HPV vaccine, which was used to prevent cervical cancer with excellent results. There would also be increased bowel cancer screening, a new programme had been launched in December in the County and in May in the City with some very successful results as there had been 8 cases of cancer identified and 45 cases of polyps identified.
The final phase was entitled moving forward. Jo stated that a Programme Director had now been appointed to see through Phase 1 and plan for phases 2 and 3. She commented that she proposed to deliver a presentation at the next meeting of the Joint Health Overview and Scrutiny Committee once the full audited results of the consultation were available. She also proposed that the Programme Director deliver a presentation to share how phrases 2 and 3 would be taken forward as well as to conclude the agreed way forward on phase 1.
A Member of the Committee enquired whether it was possible to talk about the community meeting events at the next meeting. Jo commented that it was possible to do a shared presentation. The Vice Chair commented that this was a good idea.
A Member of the Committee queried whether there was any news on the Oadby and Wigston walk in centre. Jo agreed to check and report back to the Member.
A Member of the Committee stated that there was a youth house in her ward and they regularly had 60-70 young people turn up every day. She commented that a lot of the young people had passed the St Johns Ambulance Course and that there was an opportunity available for some consultation to be conducted. Jo agreed to talk to the Member with regard to this.
A Member of the Committee queried why the target for GP extended opening hours was at 50%. Jo commented that the target had been set nationally but did not have the exact City, County and Rutland figures to hand.
The Chair stated that he wanted to see if there were any plans for pharmacies to open up longer so that it was easier for people to pick up prescriptions after they had been to see their GP.
RESOLVED:
1) that there be a presentation with a detailed, supporting paper at the next meeting of the Joint Health and Overview Scrutiny Committee which would present the audited results from the Engagement.
2) that Jo report back to the Member concerned regarding the Oadby and Wigston walk in centre in relation to the wider elements of extended GP Services and the Next Stage Review.
3) that Jo provide the Committee with a detailed breakdown of the locations of GP practices with extended hours and what those hours were.