Seven integrated care systems are working in partnership with the King’s Fund, Pathway and Groundswell as part of a shared learning programme.
The programme aims to build a community of leadership practice, drawing on insights from the seven ICSs to develop understanding of current practice in inclusion health across England, with focus on people currently experiencing homelessness or at risk of homelessness; forced migrants and refugees; Roma and traveller communities; those with substance and alcohol misuse difficulties; people involved with the criminal justice system; and sex workers.
The programme centres around how to develop consistently good services across the whole inclusion health cohort, and how to scale up examples of good practice in a given neighbourhood to achieve system-wide success.
The ICSs involved are Devon; Hampshire and the Isle of Wight; Lincolnshire; Norfolk and Waveney; North-East London; South Yorkshire; and Sussex.
Work began on the programme in September 2022 and will continue through to April 2023.
Last month, One Devon shared an update on the programme, with Head of Health Inequalities, Prevention and Population Health Management Kristian Tomblin commenting on the three goals that the ICS aims to achieve through the programme.
“We will explore and make visible the excellent practice being led by Primary Care Network Health Inequalities Leads, enabling them to easily connect with one another and act on in concurrence with local priorities,” said Kristian. “This includes the ongoing work by Devon Communities Together and their partners in general practice in exploring what learning from our most deprived populations may be applied to our more rural communities.
“We will also improve our connection with the voluntary, community and social enterprise sector to address inclusion health, building upon the current alliance of voluntary, community sector and system colleagues in addressing potential inequalities in accessing the virtual ward service.
“Finally, we will embed the ambition to become a ‘trauma-informed’ integrated care system. In this, we aim to move from merely addressing the symptoms of trauma that manifest as harmful self-coping strategies, such as substance misuse and self-harm, and actively engage with the situations in which they arise.”
