National Care Service - keeping care support local part 2 – community health care: regional forums - findings summary

Annex A – Draft Approach to Community Health Care

The following draft was shared with participants:

Community health is about relationships, person and family centred care and wellbeing support and provides the opportunity to access services in a range of settings; at health and care sites or agencies, in residential homes or peoples’ own homes supported remotely by technology where appropriate.

People may need community health for many reasons, proactive care by a range of professions and services gives continuity that where needed wraps around the person throughout their life. The principles of Getting it Right for Every Child and Getting it Right for Everyone form the core approach of care provision for all ages including connecting people to other services and coordination with acute and specialist NHS services.

Community health services comprises at least 90% of all health contacts between people and the NHS. Many needs are identified, managed, or resolved within the community, making it one of the largest sectors of healthcare and one of the most crucial.

Community Health encourages shared decision making between communities, individuals and health professionals, combining personal and professional expertise to provide the most appropriate and best outcome for the person.

People often need more than one form of support at the same time and there is huge benefit by integrating services, ensuring a joined-up experience.

Most services that are accessed locally or are based in the community address the majority of health and wellbeing concerns without escalation and reduce harm by early identification of need through multidisciplinary team discussions. This helps multidisciplinary teams to support people living in the community with increasingly complex needs at any stage of life including care around death.