This week’s leadership message is a podcast with Helen Hirst and Jo Farn

What else has been happening this week?

Local Maternity System

The West Yorkshire and Harrogate Local Maternity System (LMS) held their Board meeting last Friday. The Board includes representation from midwifery, public health, hospital consultancy and finance. The role of LMS’s is to bring together providers involved in maternity and neonatal care, including the ambulance service and independent midwifery practices. Developments in the LMS are co-designed by women, children and their families.

The performance of the Local Maternity System against the trajectories was shared at the start of the meeting. A new WY&H LMS performance dashboard has been produced which gives a clearer picture of performance against the trajectories.

Following on from the West Yorkshire and Harrogate Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) talent takeover, a discussion was held on BAME representation. Further work will be undertaken to look at this which will include staff representation and service users.

Lucy Jackson, the West Yorkshire and Harrogate Local maternity System Clinical Leadership Fellow, gave an insight into her work and how she is increasing engagement with clinicians in provider organisations.

A regional priority for perinatal mental health networks is to support data sharing to enable benchmarking and quality improvement. A system wide quality improvement tool is being developed to better reflect the interdependencies between different parts of the system in Yorkshire and the Humber and ensure a consistent approach.

Continuity of carer continues to be a challenge. New models/teams are to be launched shortly so it is anticipated that the numbers of women booked/placed onto a continuity of carer pathway will rise. Everybody continues to work hard together to ensure that the trajectory is reached.

The workforce group continues with their work. They have developed a system wide preceptorship booklet which has been distributed to our hospital trusts. We are also developing an LMS recruitment process for newly qualified midwives. The aim is to introduce a new process by the end of March 2020.

The prevention work continues to move at pace. The ‘expert groups’ have all held two meetings and developed a list of priorities to pursue. Work is also in development to increase engagement with primary care colleagues.

Chris Day (Consultant Neonatologist and Clinical Lead for Yorkshire and Humber Neonatal Operational Delivery Network) gave an update on the ongoing work. There is real positivity around the maternity and neonatal joint working.

Care markets

On Monday, 85 people from across West and North Yorkshire came together for a workshop to consider the future of the care home and home care sector. The session was led by Richard Webb, Corporate Director of Health and Adult Services, and Michelle Turner, Director of Nursing, NHS Bradford District and Craven Clinical Commissioning Groups, and facilitated by Nesta.

Each of the six local places (Bradford district and Craven, Calderdale, Harrogate, Kirklees, Leeds and Wakefield) was well represented, and there was a good mix of people who access care, frontline staff, care providers and commissioners. The session was all about thinking about what these services might look like in future, and the work that could be taken forward locally, supported by the Partnership to improve care and services. The outcomes of the work will be considered by our System Leadership Executive Group in January.

West Yorkshire and Harrogate Urgent and Emergency Programme Board

The West Yorkshire and Harrogate Urgent and Emergency Care Programme Board met on Monday with an extended attendance from across the Partnership, including colleagues from the mental health and improving population health management programmes.

Rod Barnes, CEO of Yorkshire Ambulance Services and Senior Responsible Officer for the Programme, chaired the meeting which ran as a workshop aiming to reset the programme and co-produce our priorities for work reflecting the ambitions within the NHS Long Term Plan and our six local places.

The workshop was very dynamic and was informed by:

• Feedback from the programme board members and other key stakeholders (including A +E Board chairs) on the Terms of Reference and draft work programme
• The outcome of a Healthwatch engagement report (June 2019) relating to access to urgent and emergency care services as part of the engagement work on the NHS Long Term Plan
• Hotspots highlighted within the current urgent and emergency care dashboard.

Emerging priorities included more co-ordinated work on 999 and NHS 111 and how we can improve consistency of messages we give to the public. A helpful theme was ensuring a balance and clarity between the Partnership and place based delivery with a particular focus on preparing for the winter period and how as a system we could manage winter differently this year across the area.

It was agreed that ongoing stakeholder engagement is key to this and we agreed a set up communications and engagement objectives which will be discussed with local communication and engagement leads and developed into an action plan for the area.

Mental Health, Learning Disabilities and Autism Programme Board

The Programme Board met on Tuesday. Chaired by Sara Munro, CEO Lead for the Collaborative Board and CEO for Leeds and York Partnership NHS Foundation Trust, the programme is made up of colleagues from the NHS, council and community sector. There was a series of updates from the programmes, including work to improve services for children and young people with mental health problems, autism and a learning disability; and providing the right rehabilitation support for people with complex mental health needs.

Colleagues provided an update on work to develop a patient safety collaborative through engagement with staff in mental health providers, and approved proposals to work with the Maternity programme in distributing funding for perinatal mental health.

There was also an update on assessment and treatment units for people with learning disabilities and feedback from a partnership wide Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) forum to share best practice in providing psychological therapies.

Programme colleagues will also take part in a housing and health event (likely to take place in February).

West Yorkshire Joint Health and Overview Scrutiny Committee

Colleagues from the Improving Planned Care Programme and West Yorkshire Association of Acute Trusts attended the West Yorkshire Joint Health Overview and Scrutiny Committee (WY JHOSC) meeting on Tuesday in Leeds. The work of the JHOSC supplements the local scrutiny activity where consideration is given to local progress and proposals arising from the six, place-based plans covering the local authority areas of Bradford, Calderdale, Harrogate, Kirklees, Leeds and Wakefield. The purpose of the WY JHOSC is to oversee those programmes of work being undertaken at scale and across West Yorkshire and Harrogate. It is not intended to replace local scrutiny arrangements that take place in the constituent local authority areas.

Matt Graham, Programme Director for West Yorkshire Association of Acute Trusts (hospitals working together) gave an update on the work taking places across the six hospital trusts. This included the work outlined in the WYAAT annual report, published in September 2019.

The Improving Planned Care Programme discussion was led by Dr Matt Walsh (Chief Officer, Calderdale Clinical Commissioning Group), the Clinical Lead is Dr James Thomas (Clinical Chair, Airedale, Wharfedale and Craven Clinical Commissioning Group) and the Programme Director is Catherine Thompson. JHOSC members received an update on the work taking place (please see below). There was an update on the development of the Partnership’s draft Five Year Plan, which will be discussed at the Partnership Board meeting on 3 December in Bradford.

Elective Care and Standardisation of Commissioning Policies Programme Board

The Board met on Tuesday 19 November in Halifax, chaired by Dr Matt Walsh, CEO Lead for the programme and it’s Clinical Lead, Dr James Thomas. Board members include commissioners, GPs, planned care leads, lay members and representatives from partner organisations, public health and local hospital trusts. Members discussed the programme’s hip and cataract policies and agreed these policies could progress through to clinical forum and joint committee. The Board also looked back at some of the main achievements over the last 12 months, including the first of our West Yorkshire and Harrogate policies to be agreed for implementation across all nine CCGs. These policies, for spinal services and liothyronine (for underactive thyroid gland), were approved for adoption by Joint Committee back in March 2019. Since then, more single commissioning policies and standardised clinical pathways for planned care have been adopted across the region, with others in progress. Find out more about improving Planned Care here.

Carers Right Day

The second in a series of career events to support young carers was held on Thursday as part of raising awareness for Carers Right Day. The event included young carers from across Leeds and Wakefield and builds on the success of the first event held in Kirklees earlier this year. The event, called ‘Couldn’t Care Less’, aim to show young carers how their skills can be transferred into exciting and varied roles in the health and care sector, supported by role models from across local business and the NHS. The event was also attended by young adult carers who shared their life experiences and reflections in how they made a successful transition from being a young carer to an adult carer.

There are around 260,000 carers living across West Yorkshire and Harrogate in Bradford, Airedale and Craven; Calderdale, Harrogate, Kirklees, Leeds and Wakefield. This number includes thousands of young carers taking on a caring role from as early as six years old. Often they are caring for parents who have long-term health conditions, mental health difficulties or experience alcohol and substance misuse.

To raise awareness of Carers Right Day, partners from across the area have pledged their support for carers to share good practice and learning. A lot of great work already takes place in our six local places, from partners working with voluntary and community organisations to support carers in their local areas.

In Kirklees, Carers Count delivered drop in sessions across Batley, Huddersfield where carers can discuss their rights in relation to their caring role.

Carers Leeds held a ‘Pop Up Drop By ‘ gazebo in Dortmund Square, central Leeds where they had a presence all day. Anyone needing further support was directed to Carers Leeds offices, 2 minutes around the corner.

Calderdale’s Making Space and Calderdale Carers held a joint event at The Neighbourhood Centre, Queens Road in Halifax where there were information stands, pampering sessions, complimentary therapies and lunch.

Carers Wakefield & District held their AGM and a ‘Carer Welfare’ event at Sandal Rugby Club, Sandal, Wakefield. The event encouraged carers to focus on themselves, their own health and wellbeing and their aspirations for the future. The event included presentations around mental health, physical activity, eye health, smoking, education and employment.

Across Bradford, Harrogate and Craven, Carers Resource held a number of events including a Carer, Craft and Chat in Manningham and Parent Carer Coffee and Cake Drop- in at Skipton, BD23 1PP, and a Dancing for Wellbeing session in Darley.

There was also lots of twitter activity from Fatima Khan-Shah and colleagues from the programme team, and from our partners. Watch some of our health and care leaders across the area pledge their support for carers.

System Oversight and Assurance Group

The Partnership’s System Oversight and Assurance Group (SOAG) meet today (Friday). This group takes an overview of progress with our shared priority programmes, and seeks to agree collective action to help tackle shared challenges. This month’s meeting will focus on ‘winter’ pressures, challenges and opportunities to work together.

Yorkshire & Humber Care Record

This week’s update focuses on the clinical safety assurance within the Yorkshire & Humber Care Record. You can read it on the Yorkshire and Humber Care Record website. There is still time to book your tickets for a workshop for social care practitioners, clinicians and information governance leads on 3 December. Book your ticket here.

West Yorkshire and Harrogate Healthy Hearts

Since its official launch in April, the West Yorkshire and Harrogate Healthy Hearts project has seen more than 4,500 additional people added to the hypertension register and more than 3,500 people having their blood pressure controlled to below 140/90. Because of this, over the next five years, an estimated 28 people will avoid an early death, 52 people will not have a stroke and 35 people will not have a heart attack. This will improve further now we have more people on hypertension registers and under review. Please visit the West Yorkshire and Harrogate Healthy Hearts website to download resources that can help GP practices to identify people already registered with them who have undiagnosed high blood pressure (hypertension), which can often be an indicator of cardiovascular disease.