Future Fit feedback considered by Programme Board

The Future Fit Programme Board met today (22 November) to conscientiously consider all feedback and ongoing work following the Future Fit Consultation, which ran from 30 May to 11 September 2018.

Around 60 people, including senior representatives from health organisations, councils and patient representatives from across Shropshire, Telford & Wrekin and mid Wales, took part in the all-day workshop, which was facilitated by independent consultation specialists, Participate Ltd.

Board members had the opportunity to receive and comment on the independent report on the thousands of responses to the consultation. In addition, they looked in detail at the outputs from the additional work that has been ongoing for some months. This includes public, community and non-emergency travel and transport activity, ambulance modelling, the impact that any changes to hospital services may have on seldom heard groups and the proposed plans to improve community services for health and care closer to home.

As authors of the consultation findings report, Participate talked people through the coding and analysis of all the responses to the consultation, which includes 18,742 surveys, 203 letters and emails and feedback from hundreds of meetings, events and focus groups. Participants then discussed, reflected and fully considered the key themes, detailed responses and any suggestions from individuals and organisations.

David Evans, Chief Officer of Telford & Wrekin CCG said: “We are delighted that more than 3% of local people responded to the consultation and today we have listened carefully and considered their concerns, comments and suggestions.

“We have also heard updates and commented on the ongoing work around community and non-emergency travel and transport activity, ambulance modelling, the impact that any changes to hospital services may have on seldom heard groups and the proposed plans to improve community services for health and care closer to home.”

Dr Simon Freeman, Accountable Officer for Shropshire CCG said: “Over the last five years, the Programme Board’s role has been to agree, lead and coordinate the Future Fit Programme and I am grateful to them for their support in helping to get us to this crucial stage.

“The two meetings we have held so far have enabled both CCGs, health and local authority partners and patients to hear and consider what individuals and organisations have told us during the consultation. We have now identified a number of pieces of work that we need to take our time to consider before progressing to making a decision about the future of hospital services in the new year.”

Just over half (51%) of the online and hard copy surveys received were from the Telford and Wrekin area. 19% of all surveys were received from residents of Shropshire, 8% from the Wales/Shropshire border and 8% from Powys. 9% chose not to state their postcodes and 5% were from out of the area.

In general, the mix of respondents was broadly representative of the population mix of the Future Fit area, when the survey profiling data is compared to the ‘Future Fit Equality Impact Report – September 2018’. These include:

Male respondents to the survey are slightly under-represented (36% of respondents were male compared to 49.5% of the population) but were more closely represented in the focus groups undertaken. Younger age groups (aged 16-26 years old) represent 4% of the responses, with 68% of all responses coming from respondents aged 48+ years old. Around 20% of the responses came from respondents who are parents of children under 16 years old. In terms of ethnicity, 88% of those that answered this question described themselves as White-British and 6% as White-Welsh. Only 18 surveys in total were completed in Welsh and translated for analysis. 1% of respondents described themselves as White-Other European and 1% were accounted for as other Black, Asian, Minority Ethnic Groups. The majority (99%) of all survey responses were from members of the public rather than organisations.

This workshop follows a meeting of the boards of Shropshire and Telford & Wrekin Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) which took place on 14 November 2018 where board members were presented with a first draft of the report for them to comment on.

Further meetings will take place over the coming weeks to enable all key stakeholders to reflect and comment on the feedback. This includes the Joint HOSC of Telford & Wrekin and Shropshire Councils, Powys Community Health Council (CHC), Powys Teaching Health Board, The Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust (SaTH) board and Shropshire Community Health NHS Trust board. These meetings all form part of the process towards the Joint Committee of the two CCGs meeting early in 2019 to make a decision on the future of local hospital services.