Integrating health and social care

Local councils and NHS organisations in Greater Manchester have agreed with the government that decisions affecting local people should be made here, not nationally. This devolution means we will control how billions of pounds of public money is spent in Greater Manchester.

In Bolton this new way of working includes Bolton Council, NHS Bolton Clinical Commissioning Group, Bolton NHS Foundation Trust, and Greater Manchester Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust, alongside partners in the voluntary and community sector.

They have all worked together to produce a locality plan for Bolton. Our plan looks at the challenges facing our health and care system and sets out how and why changes must be made if we are to have effective and sustainable services in the future. 

There is increasing pressure on local services and the cost of running them is going up each year.  If we continue doing things as we are now, by 2020 there will be a gap of £83 million between the cost of health and social care and the money we have available to spend. We have been making small, step by step changes to services and making savings for some years now. The pressures on services and the limited resources available mean that this is no longer enough. 

Our planned changes include:

• providing more care in the community and less in hospitals
• using technology to improve patient care
• improving Bolton’s care homes as well as social care provided in people’s homes
• joining up health and care services
• making mental health care bigger and better
• more focus on keeping people well – both mentally and physically
• boosting the role of GP practices
• improving urgent and emergency care services (including A&E) as demand increases
• ensuring our health and social care workforce is fit for the future
• working together to improve how public sector buildings are used right across the borough

   

To make these changes, services will need to work in a more joined up way with organisations working together much more closely.  This is all about focusing on the patient – not which organisation is providing the service.

We know that health and wellbeing is dependent on many other factors such as housing, education, leisure, and employment.  So, we’re working closely with other partners and organisations.

In fact, we think one of the major benefits of this new way of doing things is that it’s allowing local organisations to come together and work much more closely than we ever have before.