A new, exciting £200m venture between local health and social care providers will change the way local people in Newham get access to local health and social care services as Newham Council joined with the East London NHS Foundation Trust (ELFT) to create Health and Care Space Newham (HCSN).
Proposals for the HCSN scheme were developed by GPs, GP clinical commissioners, Newham Council and ELFT. They include developing new facilities for more joined-up health and social care services including running GP services alongside a range of community health, social care, out of hospital, and a variety of clinical services. The innovative partnership will also build much-needed housing for different groups working in health and care.
The vision is to develop ‘state-of-the-art’ facilities that combine traditional GP surgeries with advanced medical, community, social care and mental health support reducing journey times for many service users and patients. While building new homes will make working in the area more attractive to healthcare professionals who already work in Newham and encourage others to apply for vacancies.
Jonathan MacDonald, Interim Programme Lead of Health and Care Space Newham, said: “The signing of the shareholder agreement today is a major step forward in delivering improved the health estate and housing in Newham.
“The HCSN model is the first of its kind, very innovative and very ambitious. Its real strength is the robustness of the partnership underpinning the vision and with the signing of the shareholder agreement, I am looking forward to putting this vision into reality.”
HCSN is the first partnership of its kind between a local authority and an NHS organisation in the country. The the local GP federation, Newham Health Collaborative, are expected to join the partnership in 2019/20.