The plan is due to be published
in June. Sally was never going to tell the conference what the plan would say.
However, she did share information about the consultation around it, some of
the emergent themes, and what had been said about current and future mental
health services. You can find out more about how the consultation was
undertaken and how the 10 Year Health Plan is being developed here.
She started her presentation with
a question. If you asked a room full of people, the kind you find on the
ubiquitous omnibus, would they like to be in hospital today, what would they be
likely to say? I can almost guarantee that nobody would put their hand up and say
‘yes please’. Yet surprisingly, Sally noted that the majority of people would inevitably
say that the hospital is the best place to receive their health care.
It was an observation about
hospitals noted by many people during the consultation process. However, the
number one concern that participants raised was around access. People were
concerned that they couldn’t gain access to their GP, A&E or to dental
care. When people did get access to health services, they reported experiences
that were fragmented and uncoordinated. The more people interacted with NHS services,
the more uncoordinated people found their treatment and care to be. Linked to
this was a concern, expressed by healthcare professionals. Many felt they couldn’t
always maintain their professional standards when providing care to those they
looked after.
People wanted what we have now to
work better. There was, however, an almost universal agreement that more could
be done to tackle the underlying determinants of poor health and health
inequalities. That said, it appears that many people found it hard to visualise,
and understand, what a future health service might look like. This was particularly
the case over the increased use of digital technologies.
Comments from NHS colleagues
suggested something similar. Collectively, we tend to underestimate what might
be possible over the next 10 years, and overestimate what can be achieved in
just one year.
From a mental health perspective,
there were several observations that sadly resonate with those of us working in
mental health services. Top of the list was a desire for parity with physical
healthcare services. There was a particular concern that we should make funding
for mental health services compared to physical services, a lot more
transparent than the current situation. I’m not sure this will really help
achieve parity, sadly. Stigma still
seems to get in the way of folk seeking early help. Rightly so, there was
concern that we are still not meeting the needs of children and young people
effectively. We need to banish out-of-area placements for people who need a
mental health bed; reduce the length of time people spend in hospital; and for
those ‘stuck’ in hospital, to find better community-based solutions for their
continued care. There was much more to be told, but readers of this blog will
have to wait for the plan to be published to learn the full picture.
Intriguingly, the plan, when it
is published, will seemingly not have individual chapters on various services.
Cancer, mental health or cardiovascular disease for example. However, Sally did
not elaborate on how the findings will be presented instead. Hence my intrigue.
Of course, having a plan is one thing, implementing it will be the acid test.
Arguably, over the course of several different political parties promising to
make the NHS better, the social contract between the public and the NHS appears
to have been broken. I hope this is not the case. NHS colleagues, local
authorities, communities, and voluntary organisations need to hear the voices
of those who participated in the NHS 10 Year Health Plan, and act. It really is
a once in a lifetime opportunity to change.
*Other speakers included Claire
Murdock – ‘be angry and don’t sleep’ and Jim Mackey ‘if you are not
living in mental health services, you see mental health as a single entity’
No comments:
Post a Comment