Anyone who saw Suzanne Rankin speak in November at the Business South Annual Conference can’t help but have been impressed by her clear vision for future healthcare.
She believes we all have a part to play and business needs to get involved too. Read on to find out more about the North West Health and Care Alliance:
“The success of the NHS, in responding to illness and disease is now leading to the population living longer with more complex health needs, which is bringing additional demand to health services. This has created a big problem. We don’t have the workforce to keep up with the ever increasing demand nor can it be afforded; we can’t spend the whole of GDP on health. It was recently claimed that by 2024/5 spending on Health and social care will account for 40% of all public spending and whilst that figure is an over estimation since it doesn’t include things like welfare and pension payments, it is true to say that spending on healthcare has increased year on year and will prove unaffordable and unsustainable in the future.
“Health services needs to reorient from responding to illness to driving health and well-being principally by using all our capabilities to support thriving communities and employment. It’s time to look at our collective capabilities to promote healthy communities,” said Suzanne Rankin, Chief Executive of Ashford and St Peters Hospital, NHS Foundation Trust.
Rather than looking at health in isolation, Suzanne believes a more joined up approach would bring better health outcomes.
During the toughest days of the pandemic and the creation of a vaccination hub at her hospital, Suzanne realised there was huge potential to work with other sectors.
“We had people who were furloughed from the airlines and hospitality sector who came to work at the hub and it was clear there were cross-over skills.
“Over the last 18 months we have collaborated in different ways and we want to build on that for the future,” she said.
She has been a driving force behind the creation of the North West Health and Care Alliance, an organisation that includes Ashford and St Peter’s Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust: Surrey County Council: Spelthorne, Woking, Elmbridge and Runnymede Borough Councils; NHS Surrey Heartlands Clinical Commissioning Group; CSH Surrey (community healthcare providers); Woking and Sam Beare Hospice and North West Surrey Integrated Care Services (GP federation).
At the helm is Jack Wagstaff, Place Leader & Alliance Chief Officer, North West Surrey.
As Alliance Chief Officer, Jack provides strategic leadership across North West Surrey to bring different teams and organisations together to meet people’s needs in an integrated way and drive innovation through new networks across sectors.
The North West Surrey Health and Care Alliance is a formal partnership of organisations working across health, local government, the voluntary sector and private sector coming together under a formal partnership to use our collective resources, expertise and staff assets to address the wider determinants of health for the ultimate benefit of local people.” he said.
“As the Alliance we want to create mutual opportunities for both our public services and enterprise; we are an innovative group of large organisations that employ thousands of people and are responsible for significant public spending; through different forms of partnership we have huge potential to support economic growth and innovation.”
Suzanne explained she has been pondering how to optimise intellectual capabilities and engage with partners from the worlds of business and education.
“There are so many ways we could work together. I really like the example I heard recently about the Beales department store in the Dolphin Centre, Poole.
“Their footfall was down following the lockdowns and they decided to do something about it. Now the whole of the top floor of the store has been given over to NHS clinics and services for the University Hospitals Dorset NHS Foundation Trust (UHD), drawing people from all over Dorset.
Suzanne adds, we have done something similar by moving outpatient physiotherapy out of the hospital and into local health clubs and gyms. This is de-medicalising the care, as well as driving footfall to the gyms, boosting membership, the business model and employment.
“This is a shared opportunity and just the sort of thing we are keen to explore,” she said.
Jack added, “An example of the Alliance in action is that within the last year alone more resource has been moved from the NHS to our Boroughs than ever before. We are progressing large transformative developments in a number of our key towns – Woking, Addlestone and Staines-upon-Thames focused on providing services in a different way alongside local businesses, leisure and education.
In January 2021, the Alliance were successful in a bid to NHS England to become a pioneer site for a completely new design and approach for primary care and wider services in the community.
The ambition for this programme is to build community-based facilities, designed in line with sustainability goals, considering not just health and social care needs, but also economic and environmental factors.
Jack concluded, “We have joined Business South to develop our network across business and education as we could foresee many mutual opportunities with other Business South Champions which we are keen to explore. So if you would like to join our ambitious and innovative vision to improve the lives of citizens across North West Surrey we would love to hear from you!”
