Healthy London Partnership

Transforming London’s health and care together

Welcome to our fortnightly newsletter, where we update you about the partnership and our programmes.

Please share it with your colleagues and encourage them to sign up.

If there is something specific you would like to hear about, please get in touch.

Spotlight on…

…Supporting homeless people this winter

Every homeless person in London is entitled to receive care that is consistent in quality and experience with that of the general population.

We believe that systems which support homeless people should be linked up as much as possible to improve communication and outcomes as people move around the capital.

Health needs assessment

Conducting a health needs assessment is key to developing and delivering integrated care. Local Authorities must do a Joint Strategic Needs Assessment of the health and wellbeing of their local population – this includes assessing health needs of people who are or have been homeless.

Use our London homeless health assessment toolkit

Duty to refer

The Homelessness Reduction Act 2017 introduced a duty on specified public authorities to refer service users who they think may be homeless or threatened with homelessness to local authority homelessness/housing options teams.

The Government’s latest duty to refer guidance is designed for those working in a specified public authority, which is subject to the duty to refer.

See the full duty to refer guidance

See also

• The Government’s Rough Sleeping Strategy: delivery plan
• The Mayor of London’s End Homelessness campaign
• Homeless health elearning for GP practice managers and receptionists.

London the first city to exceeds UNAIDS ambitions

London’s fast track city partners celebrate progress towards cutting the rates of new HIV infections in the capital and eliminating the discrimination and stigma that blights the lives of many Londoners living with HIV.

Find out more about the initiative and the upcoming international conference

Read more about the UNAIDS 90-90-90 ambitions

Mental health in schools toolkit launch

Our new toolkit provides a range of information for schools, governors and commissioners on mental health and emotional wellbeing in schools.

Explore the topics

New statutory requirements for child death review

Recent statutory guidance outline changes to the child death review process in England.

To support the transition to these new arrangements, we are running free-to-attend workshops throughout February and March 2019 to support understanding and facilitate discussion.

Find out more and register for an event in your area

Thrive LDN launches ‘Londoners said’ report

‘Londoners said’ – a report summarising the findings of the 17 community conversations run in partnership with the Mental Health Foundation in half of London’s boroughs – was launched at the Thrive LDN Summit at City Hall on 6 December.

The summit brought together health and care partners, politicians, local councils, charities, Londoners and many more to discuss the progress being made towards improving the mental health and wellbeing of all Londoners.

Find out what Londoners said about improving mental health in their area

Primary care mental health guidance and evaluation

Our informative and practical guidance is for commissioners and providers to use when developing and delivering better services. It highlights a number of lessons learned about what is required to make services both successful and sustainable.

Take a look at the guidance

Winter preparedness resources

Winter can be a challenging time for health and care services, so we’ve put together a list of resources to help you.

Check out our winter readiness in care homes offerings

See the NHSI guide to reducing long hospital stays

See the NSHI guide to improving patient flow through urgent and emergency care

Peer review of mental health care pathways for CYP

Our report summarises the findings from peer reviews of London’s nine mental health crisis pathways for children and young people (CYP) conducted between November 2017 and May 2018.

The report provides an overview of provision for mental health crisis across London and for each area reviewed gives an overview of the findings, recommendations and some of the positive practice witnessed, as well as an overview of next steps.

Read the review

What’s new in health and care?

Commissioning

• Understanding the new commissioning system in England – Policy Research Unit in Commissioning and the Healthcare System

Data

• Our data driven future in healthcare – Academy of Medical Sciences

Digital

• Nine councils awarded funding to use digital innovation to create social care of the future
• Generation Z expect technology revolution in the NHS – Pharma Times

Health inequalities

• Making sure people seeking and refused asylum can access healthcare – Equality and Human Rights Commission

Integrated care

• Leadership in integrated care systems – SCIE

Loneliness

• National measurement of loneliness 2018 – ONS
• Children and young people’s experience of loneliness – ONS

Mental Health

• Modernising the mental health act – independent report
• Community mental health survey – CQC

Prescribing

• Matt Hancock orders review into overprescribing on the NHS – Department of Health and Social Care
• NHS Digital takes major step on road to universal e-prescriptions

Safeguarding

• Safeguarding children affected by parental alcohol and drug misuse – Public Health England

Winter

• SWL winter champions campaign toolkit

Workforce

• How the modern team can learn together in the busy workplace – Royal College of Physicians and HEE
• Improving staff retention: flexible working – NHS Employers

Taking Care of You: improving the mental health of ED staff

This new campaign from Mind aims to raise awareness of self-care to emergency department staff and provide them with advice on how to deal with issues such as stress, anxiety and depression.

In London, the campaign is underway at King’s College Hospital Foundation Trust.

Find out more about the campaign