Council partnership wins health award

Council partnership won the ‘Health and Social Care’ award at the Local Government Chronicle Awards

A Rochdale Borough Council, NHS HMR CCG and Pennine Acute Hospitals NHS Trust partnership has won the ‘Health and Social Care’ award at the Local Government Chronicle Awards.

The partnership saw off  competition from seven other councils shortlisted in the health and social care category.

The partnership was also strongly praised in the ‘Partnership of the Year’ category.

Judges commended the Intermediate Tier Service, which was launched nearly 18 months ago, for delivering a fully integrated service which offers tailored support for people’s health and care needs.

The service has helped Rochdale buck the national trend and reduce the number of delayed discharges from hospital and has provided much needed care closer to home or where safe in people own homes rather than a traditional hospital setting. In the last 12 months 2000 local residents have benefitted from personalised and comprehensive care at home and in community beds.

Through its effective partnership the Intermediate Tier Service also prevents unnecessary hospital admissions ensuring vital hospital beds are freed up. A recent council survey found that many patients prefer to transfer from hospital to their home or residential care as soon as it safe to do so.

Councillor Iftikhar Ahmed, cabinet member for adult services, said: “The award is a fantastic achievement and testament to the dedicated work of hard working staff that provide dedicated care and support day in day out. Our Intermediate Tier Service is a Rochdale success story to be proud of and I would like to congratulate everyone who works so tirelessly to deliver this pioneering policy.”

Dr Shona McCallum, lead consultant for the service, said: “This award is a fantastic endorsement of an exciting and innovative integrated model which is able to support more people to regain independent living, through a period of short term care, in either their own homes or in one of the community intermediate care beds. This can be either as a step up from community based services or as a step down from hospital or urgent care.”

Sally McIvor, joint director of Integrated Commissioning for the Council and HMR CCG, said: “We are really pleased to have been part of this partnership and receiving this award is testament to the solid joint working in Heywood, Middleton and Rochdale. We are extremely proud of the amazing results it is achieving and how this benefits our patients and our integrated working within the borough.”