Welsh health and care review calls for seamless service

22 Jan 18

An independent review of health and social care in Wales has called for the creation of a seamless service organised around users and their families, as close as possible to their homes.

Review chair Ruth Hussey said: “We have detected an appetite for change and a desire to ‘get on with it’.  A strong commitment to transform not just how much is done, but what and how it is delivered is needed.”

She had been appointed to lead the review by first minister Carwyn Jones. It published its recommendations on 16 January.

The seamless system would clear away “artificial barriers between physical and mental health, primary and secondary care, or health and social care” with stronger individual and community involvement.

“The public rightly want a modern service in which they have much better information about health and care, shared decision making in treatment, choice of care and setting, and peer support,” the report said.

Welsh health secretary Vaughan Gething said a long-term plan for health and social care would be published in the spring, taking account of the report’s recommendations.

Huw David, Welsh Local Government Association spokesperson for health and social care, said he supported the idea of an integrated system.

But he added: “The reality is that without adequate funding and new investment for health and social care in the future, the changes outlined in the report will not be enough to ensure a sustainable health and care system.”

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