It’s been a busy but productive week, with some really significant developments to mention before I hand over to a really honest and moving guest blog from a colleague to mark the end of Pride month.
But first it’s important to recognise that today is a key milestone in the NHS, with colleagues in the Lancashire and South Cumbria Integrated Care System (ICS) joining colleagues in Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) to become the Lancashire and South Cumbria Integrated Care Board (ICB).
I know that is a lot of individual letters and acronyms and the NHS is no doubt a huge and complex organisation to understand, but the changes are designed to make a difference to colleagues and patients and families by bringing different elements of it together, to drive up the quality of our services whilst reducing waste.
Of course, this isn’t just happening in Lancashire and South Cumbria. These reforms have been in train for implementation across England for some time, coming into force this morning. Local people might not see a big or obvious difference and certainly ELHT will look and feel the same, but it is a significant change in the way we operate – not least to the people who now work as part of the ICB, instead of their original organisation.
Most noticeably this impacts on CCG colleagues who have moved from locally operated and focused teams into one system-wide commissioning structure. For those not versed in the lingo, the CCGs commissioned services for local people according to local needs from healthcare providers such as East Lancashire Hospitals, but this will now be managed centrally by the ICB.
CCGs have been such a key part of operations in the NHS and this was very much the case in Pennine Lancashire, so I confess I did wake yesterday immediately mindful it was their last day.
I am enormously grateful for everything that has been done to work with us to support safe, personal and effective healthcare for local people for many years. There are some great people in the CCG’s who have moved over to form the new ICB. I have no doubt they will continue to make a difference to people’s lives irrespective of place-based configurations but I do want to say good luck and thank you to each and every person involved. It’s been a pleasure to work with you.
On Wednesday I joined other Lancashire and South Cumbria Chief Executives on a webinar aimed at all staff across the ICB, to chat about how this will work, bringing people together and talking about how we can collaborate wherever possible as part of the new Provider Collaborative Board (PCB).
I’ve blogged about some of this previously, so I won’t repeat myself, but you can see more here if you want to.
It was a good session, with hundreds of colleagues joining live and almost 100 questions asked to the assembled panel. We set out our ambitions around what we could achieve and how we could ‘level up’ services across the area as quickly as possible. Some of this work is grounded in the amazing mutual aid provided across the region during the pandemic, so there is much to build on.
You will know I am immensely proud of the Trust and everyone in it and for this reason I am keen to share what we are doing well with others as a start. We’ll do this willingly and openly as part of these new arrangements and I’ve no doubt we’ll benefit too from other organisations sharing good practice with us in return.
For me, this is one of those ‘no brainer’ ideas – 100 per cent what we should be doing across all elements of the NHS, across regions and specialisms, to make sure people get the access and quality of services we pay for through taxes. I know colleagues here at ELHT will embrace it fully too.
I have been ‘out and about’ to see people as much as possible this week and I want to mention the Quality Governance team in particular today.
I bobbed into see them at their offices at Royal Blackburn Teaching Hospital and received a warm welcome – and a somewhat unexpected ‘speed dating’ session designed to help me get to know them and everything they do within a short space of time.
As a newly married man, I will just say this was completely above board and professional (as I know Mrs H reads the blog) but it was a great way to quickly demonstrate the wide range of work delivered by this team. It was really impressive actually, especially the ‘interconnectivity’ of how the department works across and between various functions.
As well as saying a massive thank you to them for their time I want to add something that goes for all colleagues across the Trust.
I do recognise the pressures under which people are working and the lack of resources, including recruiting enough people to the team. To this point, ELHT is always looking for great people across all disciplines – and it would be remiss of me not to plug our vacancies and encourage anyone who wants to join this brilliant organisation to get in touch. You can see all roles here.
I also want to come back to something I said last week and reiterate it following this visit too. I do hear and understand the concerns of colleagues across a great many themes which are all linked to working for and at the Trust. I won’t break confidences by sharing any in detail here but they resonate with a great number of people equally.
We are operating in a constrained financial and regulatory system – there’s no getting away from that – but I always listen and do everything I can to address concerns or issues as quickly as I can.
Thanks to everyone in the department for the welcome and everything you’re doing, each and every day.
Let me now introduce a guest blog from colleague Rae who has worked at the Trust for a number of years. I won’t provide any spoilers but just say it’s well worth a read. Lots of people tell me they love the blog because its honest and sincere, which I take as a great compliment and appreciate hugely. Let me tell you, Rae’s blog, which you can read more of here, is honest and sincere too. It’s also important, uplifting and bursts with the principles that underpin everything we do and aspire to be.
So far as I am concerned, this Trust actively welcomes, supports and treats all colleagues, patients and their families equally. I am proud of that. I am proud of who we are individually and as a team and I want every person connected, whether colleague or patient, to feel the same.
Thanks Rae for sharing your story and being such a big part of our LGBTQ+ journey. It is appreciated and I am so pleased we’re making progress to be proud of. Happy Pride.
Martin