As 2019 draws to a close, I wanted to take the opportunity to thank you for your continued hard work and the difference it makes to improving the health and wellbeing of the people who live and work in South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw.
This is our third full year working together as a System and despite a challenging twelve months, South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw partners have continued to make significant progress in delivering our ambitions. You can read more about the achievements and highlights below.
Best wishes for the festive season and 2020.
Sir Andrew Cash
Chief Executive
South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw Integrated Care System
January 2019
Following the launch of The NHS Long Term Plan which pledged to ‘save almost half a million more lives’ and invest in world-class technology, Integrated Care Systems were highlighted as being central to the delivery of its ambitions (Section 1.5).
January also saw one of a number of stakeholder events, in which the ICS joined-up with NHS England to host a clinical leadership 'discovery day’. Over 80 clinicians from across professions, services and organisations attended with the aim of improving cross-organisational understanding of how working together across the System can collectively improve clinical leadership and engagement.
February 2019
In February South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw was celebrated for being the first area in the country to develop an AHP (Allied Health Professional) Council, recognising the importance and value that AHPs bring to the healthcare workforce. Their roles are highly skilled and enable them to work flexibly across a broad range of services including hospitals, community providers, primary care setting, schools, ambulance services, social care and the voluntary sector. They are vital for the future landscape of health and care services in the region. A list of the kinds of AHP roles were published in theICS AHP strategy.
February also saw Hospital Trust partners in South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw designate 'host' sites for five services. The hosts co-ordinate the running of the network in a supportive way - not to provide services on behalf of others or take on any clinical or financial responsibility for others (view the full announcement on the website). This was as a result of the hospital services review (May 2018) and the 'hosts' are:
- Gastroenterology – Doncaster and Bassetlaw Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
- Maternity – The Rotherham NHS Foundation Trust
- Paediatrics – Sheffield Children’s NHS Foundation Trust
- Stroke – Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
- Urgent and Emergency Care – Barnsley Hospital NHS Foundation Trust
February was also the month the ICS Workforce Hub team joined-up with Hospital Trust partners to deliver a collaborative nursing bank model, which supports the movement of workforce for enhanced flexibility to work across sites and between organisations. The Trusts are:
- Barnsley Hospital NHS FT
- Chesterfield Royal Hospital NHS FT
- Doncaster and Bassetlaw Teaching Hospitals NHS FT
- Sheffield Children's Hospital NHS FT, and;
- Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS FT
March 2019
As the ICS moved into the first month of Spring, stakeholders were informed about a new type of medical professional now providing valuable care for patients - and easing the pressure on NHS services in South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw.
In March it was announced that 33 Physician Associates roles across South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw were easing the burden on busy doctors and nurses. As medically trained healthcare professionals, these new additions to the medical workforce are able to work fluidly across the region’s hospitals, GP practices and in the community.
There are six Physician Associates currently working at Barnsley Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, three at Rotherham NHS Foundation Trust, 12 at Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, four in the region’s mental health trusts and 10 working in primary and community care. Physician Associate roles include a number of healthcare duties such as taking a patient’s medical histories, performing physical examinations and analysing test results - to name a few. You can watch two video interviews with Physician Associates working across the patch on the SYB ICS website
April 2019
In April high performance metrics for the Continuity of Carer target for maternity patients surpassed what had been achieved in 2018/19. The national ambition of 20% of women booked onto a Continuity of Carer Pathway by March 2019 had previously been a challenge for Local Maternity Systems (LMS') to achieve. However, as a region over 22% of women were booked onto a Continuity of Carer Pathway leading to highly positive feedback from those closely involved in the development and delivery of the pathways.
April was a successful month with People Management Awards shortlisting two new South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw innovative workforce initiatives. The first was for the aforementioned System wide efficiency saving of over £1.72m to support the System-wide use and deployment of a nursing bank staff single provider. The second was for a collection of projects developed by the South Yorkshire Regional Excellence Centre (SYREC) bringing health and social care organisations together to improve the education and training opportunities for care and support staff.
May 2019
A new South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw wide team was set up to review the medication needs of residents in care homes and ultimately improve their quality of life. This System-wide team, comprising of three Pharmacists and five Pharmacy Technicians make regular in-person visits to care homes to speak with residents about their medicines, and where necessary, make changes to help them get the maximum benefit - minimising any unwanted side effects. The added benefit of this new initiative was training care home staff to make sure medicines are administered correctly at the right time, in the right dose and for the right reasons and avoiding medicine-related hospital admissions. Information and a video about this is available on the website.
Details were published about a jointly-funded project between the ICS and Health Education England North, to review and support the possible implementation of Musculoskeletal (MSK) First Contact Practitioner roles in primary care across the System. Musculoskeletal First Contact Practitioners in primary care give patients quick access to expert assessment, diagnosis, treatment and advice and prevent short-term problems becoming long-term conditions. First Contact Practitioners also help to free up appointment time for GPs.
In support of Mental Health Awareness Week, the South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw Suicide Prevention Steering Group hosted a one-off workshop ‘The Aftermath of Suicide and the role of the Media’ at New York Stadium, Rotherham. South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw experiences a higher suicide rate compared against the national average. This informative workshop brought together over 80 people from NHS, local media, police, voluntary sector and prison. Delegates also heard from local people whose families had been affected by suicide and listened to presentations from the Samaritans and the Independent Press Standards Organisation.
June 2019
Members of the public had their say on the South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw five year plan. Using the NHS Long Term Plan as the backdrop, the sessions gave members of the public a valuable opportunity to contribute their views towards the development of the ICS five year plan.
The engagement was centred around five key topics – Cancer, Mental Health and Learning Disabilities, Care in your neighbourhood, Prevention, and Digital – with all feedback from the audience set to be independently analysed and included in the Long Term Plan response. All feedback from the events, along with extensive further engagement across SYB patients, public, staff and partners, has since been independently analysed and included in the South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw Five Year Plan.
June also saw a welcome inclusion by NHS England in their guide, 'Designing Integrated Care Systems in England', aimed at all health and care leaders working to offer well-co-ordinated efficient services. South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw was used as an example of what the three levels at which decisions are made in an Integrated Care System (Neighbourhood, Place and System), look like in a local system.
July 2019
A Task and Finish Group was set up to lead the development of the SYB ICS' five year plan, taking forward the planning and development of the System response. The group included representatives from the ICS Programmes, Places, providers and commissioners.
July was also a busy month for public and partner engagement events including the Annual General Meetings (AGMs) of three of the CCGs in South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw at Sheffield, Doncaster and Rotherham, followed by Bassetlaw and Barnsley later in the year. The ICS attended each event to talk to members of the public about system working.
4,000 people signed-up to a new employment trial, Working Win, an innovative health led employment trial, supported by partners in South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw ICS, to help job seekers receive support to find or stay in work whilst living with a health condition.
The new Stroke Hosted Network was introduced with a much-improved emergency response regarding immediate and rehabilitation care across the System. This will reduce death rates and long-term disabilities, whilst allowing the System to sustain high-quality, responsive care for our 1.5 million population. Supported by the Stroke Association, Hyper Acute Stroke Units (HASU) are now based in three places – Doncaster Royal Infirmary, the Royal Hallamshire Hospital in Sheffield and Pinderfields Hospital in Wakefield – for all South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw patients, depending on which is the closest and most appropriate for them.
Hyper acute stroke care will no longer be provided in Barnsley or Rotherham Hospitals and Barnsley and Rotherham stroke patients would be taken instead to one of the regional hyper acute stroke units. The change happened in Rotherham from 1 July 2019 and in Barnsley from 1 October 2019.
All hospitals continue to provide acute stroke care and rehabilitation services and Barnsley and Rotherham patients are ‘repatriated’ to their local hospital as soon as medically possible.
August 2019
In August details were given about Primary Care in South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw receiving £57.5 million new funding to improve facilities in a new NHS spending pledge announced by the Prime Minister. The £57.5m for South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw is funding for which the South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw Integrated Care System submitted a bid in 2018.
August also saw the Workforce Hub employ a Schools Engagement Team responsible for working with local schools and colleges to promote the various career opportunities across health and social care to young people in South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw.
September 2019
In September the ICS announced details of a pilot by the Workforce Hub to further strengthen the partnership between social care and hospitals for the benefit of patients and the public. This was trialled in Doncaster with the aim to cut hospital admissions.
£2.5m funding was pledged to South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw ICS to improve mental health services in Sheffield to enable support to be offered closer to people’s homes and deliver better joined-up mental health support services. This new model will look to ensure there is ‘no wrong door’ for mental health services, meaning wherever patients try to get their support they will be seamlessly supported to get what they need, rather than referred to another agency.
The ICS, with partners NHS Sheffield Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG), Sheffield Health and Social Care Trust, Primary Care Sheffield, Sheffield MIND and Sheffield City Council, put in a bid for the funding to put mental health services into Sheffield neighbourhoods, closer to where people live and more aligned to their GP practices.
October 2019
The Allocate UK national awards industry event recognised South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw's eRostering approach in the ‘impacting working inclusively across boundaries award’ category for the joined up approach that all partners are taking in the region to finding innovative solutions to tackling workforce issues.
The ICS announced details about the development of a national cancer data hub – with the potential to help save up to 30,000 people a year in the UK. It will provide improved treatments and save lives. It’s part of a successful, multi-agency, bid, which has seen Yorkshire and Humberside awarded part of a £4.5million pledge by the government to set up the hub; DATA-CAN (The Health Data Research UK Hub for Cancer) will be supported by patients, charities, clinicians, academic and industry-based researchers and innovators, and will involve cancer hospitals across the UK. The Health Data Research Hubs are part of a four-year £37million investment from the Government Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund (ISCF), led by UK Research and Innovation, to create a UK-wide system for the safe and responsible use of health-related data on a large scale.
A Guiding Coalition Workshop was held with over 50 delegates from across the System to contribute to the development of the SYB Five Year Plan. This generated discussion and useful topics to fine-tune our Plan.
The ICS supported World Mental Health Day through an autism workshop with representatives from the NHS, social care and the community and voluntary sector, alongside people with autism and their carers, to design and improve the support they receive. There were over 80 delegates providing insight, experience and suggestions for how improvements might be made in pathways across the System, going beyond healthcare and looking at public and community services too.
November 2019
In November it was announced that four Trusts will benefit from funding for new cancer testing and detection technology. The new machines will improve screening and early diagnosis of cancer, and are part of the government’s commitment to ensure 55,000 more people survive cancer each year. The Trusts are
· Barnsley Hospital NHS Foundation Trust
· Doncaster and Bassetlaw Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
· Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
· The Rotherham NHS Foundation Trust
A new £1 million pound scheme was announced to help support people living in South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw who have severe mental illness and want to stay in or find work. Led by South Yorkshire Housing Association, the partnership includes South Yorkshire Housing Association, Citizen’s Advice Sheffield and all of the region’s mental health services providers - Sheffield Health and Social Care NHS Foundation Trust; Rotherham, Doncaster and South Humber NHS Foundation Trust; South West Yorkshire Partnership NHS Foundation Trust; and Nottinghamshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust. The money will be spent on increasing the number of Individual Placement and Support (IPS) employment specialists working within NHS secondary mental health services. Their role will be to support patients with severe mental illness in finding sustainable employment.
The Community Partnership Alliance (CPA) and the South Yorkshire Region Excellence Centre (SYREC) were finalists at the 2019 HSJ Awards. Nominated for the category of ‘System Led Support for Carers’, the CPA, a local Community Interest Company (CIC), and SYREC, were able to demonstrate how their effective partnership has created new developmental opportunities for paid and unpaid health and social care support staff.
December 2019
Colleagues working on child health in South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw were invited to sign up to the Transforming Child Health Yorkshire and the Humber Assembly (January 14th), hosted by the SYB ICS Children's Clinical Network. Tickets still available.
Finally, the year ended with news about the ICS Hosted Networks leadership appointments. The Networks, each of which is hosted by one of our local hospital Trusts, will build upon region-wide work to deliver improved and transformed care for patients in their specialty giving our wider health population the same access to high standards of care.
The Networks’ work programmes will particularly focus upon workforce development, innovation, and the reduction of unwarranted variation. All of the Leads will be in post by January 2020.
