Agenda item

11:00

Ian Wilson, Interim Chief Executive of OCCG will discuss the feedback received from their recent series of ‘A Call to Action’ public meetings held around the county to understand what people want from their NHS service. He will explain how the public feedback has been taken into consideration in the drafts of the OCCG’s 5-year Strategic Plan and 2-year Operational Plan which are being presented to NHS England in February. February 2014’s update from the OCCG is attached at JHO6.

Ian Wilson, Interim Chief Executive and Dr Joe McManners, OCCG attended the meeting to present their OCCG update (JHO6).

During the presentation Mr Wilson referred to the OCCG’s revised constitution at which he paid tribute to Dr Stephen Richards, the former Chief Executive of OCCG,  for the considerable support he had given to him in his new role as interim Chief Executive. Members of the Committee took this opportunity to thank Dr Richards in appreciation for his contribution to the work of the Committee and wished him well for the future.

Mr Wilson made reference to a modified version of Outcomes Based Commissioning which the OCCG Governing Body had decided to take forward at their January 2014 meeting, as set out at paragraphs 2 and 3, of the report, which had taken the best elements forward using a collaborative approach, following consultation. The Committee received an assurance that the public would be able to see evidence of the new modified model in action in the OCCG Board papers online. In relation to mental health commissioning, Mr Wilson also reassured Members that because data would be collected in an assiduous manner, any problems would be picked up early which would in turn lead to better outcomes for patients and a better quality of service. The intention was to monitor this very closely.

Reference was also made to feedback received from the recent series ‘A Call to Action’ public meetings which were held around the county from November 2013 to January 2014 with the aim of understanding what people wanted from their NHS service. Since then, the OCCG had agreed six objectives for its 5 year Strategic Plan and 2 year Operational Plan (to be presented to NHS England in February) which had been revised in light of the public feedback. In response to a question, Mr Wilson confirmed that the OCCG had modified their objectives in response to public consultation, adding that once the objectives were put into practice, they would cease to feel like ‘motherhood and apple pie’.

In response to questions raised by Members of the Committee, Dr McManners confirmed that data on the ethnicity of patients was being collected by GPs. This was linked to the requirements of the Joint Strategic Needs Assessment (JSNA) to seek out where the inequalities were in the County and closer links between Health and Public Health teams were being forged. The Director of Public Health commented that the various responsibilities of Health and Public Health to contribute to the Joint Health & Wellbeing Strategy and the JSNA ensured that a close eye was kept on areas of health inequalities within the County. With regard to the issue of longer waiting times for patients in general practice, Dr McManners referred to the considerable emphasis being placed on preventative care which it was envisaged would serve to combat this problem. He added that there had been a large increase in people wanting appointments and considerable variability in how practices were responding. The Locality Teams were gleaning information on where the problems lay and thought was being given to ways of improving patient care, given the limited resources.

Mr Wilson and Dr McManners were thanked for the update.