Our Health Together
Living our Best Lives in Lanarkshire
Thank You
The consultation period for our new health care strategy, ‘Our Health Together – Living Our Best Lives in Lanarkshire’ has ended. Thank you for taking the time to give us your feedback.
What matters to you and to our staff will play an important part in planning how we should deliver our services in the future.
We will use this feedback to develop our new strategy ‘Our Health Together – Living Our Best Lives in Lanarkshire’.
View our animation and BSL video below to find out about our new health strategy ‘Our Health Together – Living our Best Lives in Lanarkshire‘.
What matters to you?
Our new health care strategy, Our Health Together – Living Our Best Lives in Lanarkshire, gives us an exciting opportunity to explore new ways that we can deliver health care in Lanarkshire.
We know that some people in Lanarkshire may already have taken part in discussions about our services. We want to use this information and build on it to help us understand what matters to the communities across Lanarkshire. We want use this feedback to inform the design, planning and delivery of services in Lanarkshire.
We have developed a number of topics we want to hear your thoughts about. These are:
- Factors that impact on your health and well being
- Ways we can best support you to stay well
- Access to our services
- The role of digital developments in your healthcare
What will we do with the information we collect?
When our programme is complete we will gather together and review all the information collected. We will use the answers and feedback we receive and will:
- Identify common themes
- Consider what is working well and what needs improving
- Identify gaps in our services
- Use this to shape our priorities
We will also share the learning and themes with our workstreams.
The information we receive will be used to shape our new healthcare strategy ‘Our Health Together – Living our Best Lives in Lanarkshire’.
Involving People
Our new health care strategy, Our Health Together – Living Our Best Lives in Lanarkshire, will:
- Support our communities to make the most of their health and wellbeing
- Address the challenges of the last 3 years
- Build sustainable future services that our children and grandchildren can enjoy
We know that a lot has changed over the last 3 years. The pandemic and cost of living crisis continue to affect the health and wellbeing of the people who live and work in Lanarkshire. We want to build on positive changes and to ensure that we deliver the best quality care.
Why we need your feedback
We know we must listen to what matters to you and to our staff. This means residents of Lanarkshire and our staff will play an important part in planning how we should deliver our services in the future.
We will use this feedback to develop our new strategy ‘Our Health Together – Living Our Best Lives in Lanarkshire’.
Our commitment
We will involve patients, carers, staff, the voluntary sector and local communities (including children and young people).
We will work together to develop plans that deliver the best possible outcomes.
Why we need to change – Population
Our services continue to recover from the pandemic which affected almost every aspect of health and social care. We had to quickly change the way we delivered services. Most of the changes introduced were positive but we know that some have been less popular. We also know there are other challenges facing us that we need to plan for now. There are also opportunities to change the way we deliver care.
Our population is changing
In future we will have more older people, with less people of working age to help to deliver our services:
- Lanarkshire’s population will increase by 3,332 people. That’s over 0.5% over the next 10 years.
- From 2021 to 2031 our over 75s are expected to increase by 13,798. That’s 25.7% by 2031, with a further 18,959 people (28.1%) by 2041.
- From 2021 to 2031 the 15 years and under population will decrease by 9,989. That means approx. 9.1% fewer under 15s by 2031, with a further reduction of 1,914 people (1.9%) people by 2041.
Why we need to change – Health
We know that many of our older population will live healthy, engaged and independent lives and will continue to support their families and communities. A growing population with an increase in those over the age of 75 will put extra demands on our services. We know that people aged over 75 are more likely to:
- Need support with their health issues
- Have more than one long term health condition
- Have complex medical needs which will increase demands on our services
It is important that everyone takes responsibility to be as healthy as they can be and manages their own health conditions as far as possible.
We have more people with poor health in Lanarkshire
Life expectancy and ‘healthy’ life expectancy are closely linked with poverty and deprivation. What do we mean by this? A healthy life expectancy is the average life spent with good health. Deprivation is the lack of or having limited access to basic materials needed to live e.g. income, education, health and housing.
Within Lanarkshire we see more cancer, heart disease, neurological disease (things like Parkinson’s or dementia) and mental health conditions compared to the other parts of Scotland. We also have more people in our hospitals with lung diseases, even though these levels are reducing across Scotland.
NHS Lanarkshire
- We have more people in poor health than a lot of other areas in Scotland
- We have the second lowest life expectancy in Scotland
- We have more areas of deprivation than other areas of Scotland
- We were affected more by the pandemic than other areas of Scotland
NHS Lanarkshire will work with our local community to try to address how poverty affects the health of the people of Lanarkshire. We are a large local employer and we will continue to offer employment opportunities for local residents. Where possible we will buy goods and services from local suppliers.
Why we need to change – Covid-19
Impact of Covid-19 on our communities and services
Local organisations and voluntary groups worked tirelessly with NHS Lanarkshire during the pandemic. We were able to quickly change how we provided services. We were, however, affected more than many other areas across Scotland and are now seeing patients who are living with the long term effects of the disease. Our staff continue to work to manage the impact of the pandemic. We continue to recover our services and build on the positive changes made.
Covid-19 Challenges
- We continue to see high numbers of patients with Covid-19
- We are now seeing people in poorer health with more advanced health conditions because care was accessed less during the pandemic
- We have much longer waiting times for care, treatments and planned appointments
- Child development has suffered
- Care services who support people in their homes are struggling
- Effect of the pandemic on our staff is taking its toll
We will continue to deliver Covid-19 vaccinations and this should reduce the impact of the disease on our population. We are still trying to understand the long term impact of the pandemic on our local residents. We will continue to support our staff, partners and local communiities to recover from the impact of the pandemic. This is an area of focus across the NHS in Scotlans and may change how and where care is delivered.
Why we need to change – Resources
We need to maximise what can be achieved with our resources
It is important that we make best use of our resources and make sure services are available for those who need care in the future.
Resource Pressures
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Higher demand for services and backlogs from Covid-19 has left us with financial and workforce pressures
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Our staff need time to recover from the impact of the pandemic and adjust to the different challenges facing them
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There are challenges filling roles across the NHS
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High numbers of staff are leaving the NHS
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We need to recover our services and reduce waiting times for our patients
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We need our patients to use our services differently
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The cost of living crisis impacts on our budgets too and we have seen the cost of our supplies and equipment increasing
These pressures on our budgets mean we need to look at ways to do things differently. These need to be efficient and cost effective. Most of all, we want to ensure we still deliver high quality services for our patients and carers. We need our patients to use our services in a different way. This includes:
- Patients managing their own health conditions as much as they can
- Fewer in-person appointments
- Being seen by different health care professionals and not just a Doctor.
We need to think about ways to save money so we can introduce new developments and modernise our care.
Why we need to change – Advances
Advances in medicine and technology drive positive change
The way we see and treat our patients is very different compared to a few years ago. Advances in medicine and medical technology have:
- Saved lives
- Increased the number of people we can help
- Helped us to get better outcomes
- Given a better quality of life to many people who live across Lanarkshire
- Changed the way we deliver care to our patients and service users
Research means we will continue to learn and develop new treatments and medicines that can help more people. Technology will continue to develop and we know this gives us the best opportunities to change and improve our services for you. The way our local communities access and receive care will continue to change as more opportunities become available. We will need our staff and patients to interact with us in different ways.
Some examples of developments that transform care
- Better sharing of information
- Using technology to support diagnosis & provide care – e.g. video consultations, remote monitoring, decision support and automated diagnosis
- Understanding of genetics – causes of disease and tailored therapies. This means that patients get the treatments and advice that works best for them.
- New medicines and therapies
- Advances in robotic assisted technology
- Virtual reality being used in surgery
What do we need to do together?
We will continue to make changes that mean our health service can deliver quality care now and in the future. This includes ensuring the people of Lanarkshire are as healthy as they can be. We will provide education and support that promotes self-management and ensures that people access the services they need.
NHS Lanarkshire already delivers positive change for our patients and the local community. We need to be thinking now about how our services need to change and evolve. When patients interact with our services, this will be in a different way. We will also need our staff to change the way they deliver care.
Our services are under more strain and this means there is a risk that some of our patients will not receive the quality of care we want to deliver. We need to take action to change this now. We also need to think how we will change in the future. Information on examples of current projects which aim to reduce pressures across our services can be found here: nhslanarkshire.scot.nhs.uk/operationflow
Our Ambitions
‘Right Care, Right Place, Right Time, First Time’
Community
- Empower self-management
- Better education to help people manage their conditions
- We will deliver as much care as possible as close to people’s homes
- We will work with other organisations to help and encourage people to be more healthy
- For community and primary care, we will signpost to the appropriate professional
Secondary Care
- Only go to hospital if really needed
- We will prevent unnecessary admissions
- There will be shorter hospital stays
- There will be earlier discharges supported by community teams
- Increase in day surgery and treatments
Remote monitoring of health conditions
Increase use of telemedicine
Use of digital and apps to access advice
Our role
We are responsible for improving health and delivering healthcare services to over 654,000 people across Lanarkshire
- 14,000 staff provide our services
- We deliver care in a variety of settings, from community based services to acute hospital wards, as well as secure settings
- Some services are delivered in people’s own homes or via video consultation
There are also a range of independent contractor facilities that provide a supporting role to NHS Lanarkshire.
We are working with our partners to build new modern premises, meaning that local services are available in the same place or as close to each other as possible. This will make it easier for people to get the help they need.
NHS Lanarkshire:
- 3 – Acute Hospitals
- 98 – General Practices (GPs)
- 12 – Community Hospitals
- 139 – Dental Practices
- 105 – Pharmacies
- 99 – Opticians
What next?
When will the strategy “Our Health Together” be complete?
We need to learn about what matters to the people in our communities and our staff. This information will help us shape our services. We will continue to have discussions throughout 2023 and hope to have a final draft of our strategy by November 2023.
April 2023
- Start of community & staff engagement programme
June 2023
- End of community & staff engagement programme
July to September 2023
- Develop strategy informed by the engagement programme
November 2023
- Sign off and launch ‘Our Health Together’
How people got involved
We engaged with staff and members of the public between April and June 2023.
We did this in a number of different ways.
- Face to face sessions using our existing networks e.g.
- Service user and carer groups
- Community health improvement teams
- Voluntary sector partners, VANL (Voluntary Action North Lanarkshire) and VASLan (Voluntary Action South Lanarkshire)
- We asked an external company ‘Snook’ to support our public engagement
- We held some information sessions where you can come along, find out more and share your views in person
- We talked with children and young people via schools, colleges and universities
- We talked to our staff and staff side partners
- We collected views on-line via surveys
- We used information that had already been collected through other engagement events.
Online Surveys
- Public Survey – NOW CLOSED
- Staff Survey – NOW CLOSED
Note: Staff resident in Lanarkshire could also complete the public survey based on their experiences as service users. - Palliative and End of Life Care Survey – NOW CLOSED
Public Engagement Events
Online public engagement events via MS Teams were held as follows:
- Thursday 11 May at 10:30am
- Thursday 1 June at 6:30pm
To receive the meeting link, people needed to register to attend by sending an email to ourhealthtogether@lanarkshire.scot.nhs.uk with “public meeting” in the subject line and provide their name, daytime contact number and the first part of their postcode. People could also indicate if they required British Sign Language interpretation.
Staff Engagement Events
Three acute hospital roadshows took place as follows:
- University Hospital Hairmyres, Wednesday 10 May at 10:00am, Lecture Theatre
- University Hospital Wishaw, Tuesday 16 May at 10:00am, Lecture Theatre
- University Hospital Monklands Wednesday 24 May at 10:00am, Lecture Theatre
Two online Health and Social Care Partnership events via MS Teams took place as follows:
- Health and Social Care North Lanarkshire, Thursday 15 June at 10:30am
- South Lanarkshire Health and Social Care Partnership – Tuesday 13 June at 1:30pm
Voluntary sector partners
There were also engagement sessions organised by the third sector interfaces for voluntary organisations in North and South Lanarkshire. Engagement events for members only were as follows:
- VasLan – Rural, 18 May 2023
- Vaslan – Urban, 5 June 2023
- VanL – North East for Bellshill, Motherwell and Wishaw Localities, 12 June 2023
- VanL – North West for Airdrie, Coatbridge and the North Localities, 19 June 2023
MSP/MP Briefing Session
An online briefing session via MS Teams took place as follows:
- MSP/MP Briefing Session, 9 June 2023 at 10:00am
Thank you
Contact Us
Give us your views by completing our on-line surveys:
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- Public Survey
- Staff Survey – Note: Staff resident in Lanarkshire can also complete the public survey based on their experiences as service users.
If you have ideas, comments or questions, email us at ourhealthtogether@lanarkshire.scot.nhs.uk
