NHS England to help with frontline funding challenges

18 Feb 14
Eleven areas in England that face health service funding challenges are to receive help from NHS England to better plan their spending

In a joint initiative agreed with regulator Monitor and the NHS Trust Development Authority, NHS England will help commissioners and providers develop integrated five-year plans that effectively address local challenges. The areas selected include two parts of London – both the southwest and northeast of the capital – as well as Cumbria, Eastern Cheshire, Staffordshire and Devon.

As part of the annual planning round in the NHS, all health service organisations are being urged to plan over a five-year period to tackle the long-term financial and operational challenges facing the system. This comes as part of a £20bn efficiency target for the service by 2015.

The eleven areas have been chosen on the basis that they will benefit most from external support in the first few weeks of the new financial year, NHS England announced. 

Responsibility for delivering strategic plans will remain with the individual commissioners and providers, but external assistance will be provided to test whether strategic planning in being undertaken in the most effective way. 

In each area, a specialised team will examine supply and demand for services, the effectiveness of option development and analysis for services, as well as the implementation of the chosen approach.

NHS England’s chief financial officer Paul Baumann said resources were being invested now to help organisations plan effectively. ‘The health economies identified are those where we believe that this immediate support will have the greatest long-term impact, providing significant positive benefits to patients and taxpayers in the future,’ he added.


The full list of areas selected is:

South West London

North East London

Cumbria

Eastern Cheshire

Staffordshire

Mid Essex

Cambridge and Peterborough

Leicestershire

Northamptonshire

East Sussex

Devon



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