The NHS and local communities are working together to identify and address healthcare inequalities by improving access to new health technologies and medicines. Over £4 million has been made available to support NHS England’s Innovation for Healthcare Inequalities Programme (InHIP) which builds on the achievements and learning of AHSNs and the Accelerated Access Collaborative (AAC) in improving access to healthcare innovations.
Initiatives to tackle healthcare inequalities in all three integrated care systems in the Oxford AHSN region are among those to win support. The focus is on severe asthma, chronic respiratory disease and cardiovascular disease (CVD) in line with the NHS Core20Plus5 approach to reducing healthcare inequalities. Each project will receive £100,000.
- Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire West (BOB)
Supporting evidence-based management and clinical optimisation of people with uncontrolled and severe asthma living in the most deprived areas. The integrated severe asthma care project team will use population health management and system tools to proactively identify, review and refer individuals with potential severe asthma to the rapid access clinic for review and medicines optimisation including initiating biologic therapy.
Dr Amar Latif, Primary Care Respiratory Clinical Lead, BOB Integrated Care Board, said: “We are delighted with this new NHS funding to continue our work to ensure patients with severe asthma can get prompt and leading-edge treatment across BOB – in a bid to tackle health inequalities.
“For over a year the project has worked closely with GP practices from targeted primary care networks to identify patients with severe asthma in the more deprived areas of the region. Many were given check-ups and if appropriate some were treated at the severe asthma clinic in Oxford using pioneering medication and modern treatment to improve their health and wellbeing.
“Our priority has been to tackle health inequalities by providing these patients with access to the best treatment available. We will continue to make this our goal by working in other areas of deprivation in the region with GP practices we have yet to support. We thank all our NHS partners for helping get the project team launched and for enabling us to improve the lives of so many patients so far.”
- Frimley
Extending community-based input to ensure best care and prevent deterioration in people with chronic respiratory disease, utilising a proactive outreach programme and remote management where appropriate.
- Bedfordshire, Luton and Milton Keynes
Optimising self-management and treatment of CVD through proactive outreach into GP practices to identify patients with known CVD and co-design a service model, incorporating a review by a specialist healthcare professional and including evidence-based lipid-lowering therapies.