Agenda item

The Board received a report from the Strategic Director – Health and Community which provided a summary of the findings of the first Joint Strategic Needs Assessment (JSNA) Health.

It was noted that Directors of Adults’ Social Services, Public Health and Children and Young People’s (CYP) Services in every Local Authority and Primary Care Trust (PCT) had a statutory duty from April 2008 to work together to develop a JSNA for their area.

For the production of the first JSNA Halton focused on refining, improving and bringing together the information we had available which highlighted overall population needs. This information was from national and local sources and included a wealth of information we had collected directly from services across Halton. This information was used to take a longer term view of population trends and the likely impact on demand over the next years and decades.

Members were advised that JSNA was intended to identify the big picture in terms of the health and well-being needs and equalities within the local population. It was not intended to describe how we would address the needs, demonstrate outcomes or showcase our services. The aim was that the information contained in the JSNA would encourage partner agencies to use the findings to inform a number of local authority and PCT strategies, Client Group Commissioning Plans, Local Area Agreement etc. It had already been used within Halton to feed into Ambition for Health and the Joint Commissioning Plan.

The development of the JSNA was not a single, one-off exercise but was an ongoing piece of work, which would add to our commissioning “intelligence”. As we continued to develop our JSNA we would:-

• Build upon service user and care views
• Include information about service usage
• Ensure we have information at a local level as well as overall trends.

It was further noted that the approval process for the JSNA within the PCT was currently being reviewed. It was anticipated that would go to the PCTs Management Team and then the Trust Board, once the St. Helens JSNA was ready.

Members were advised of the consultation process undertaken and it was noted that a key element of this was the production of an accessible public document on the local priorities detailing how the JSNA would feed into commissioning plans for the future and the evidence based investment decisions taken. This had been achieved through the development of the summary of findings documents, which was available as an Appendix to the report.

It was proposed that the consultation process be in four states as follows:

1)         Professionals

2)         Members via all Policy and Performance Board   (January                     2009)

3)         Key stakeholders

4)         General public

At each stage the document would be revised and updated accordingly.

Members queried whether the high cancer rate was due to the industrial environment of Halton. In response, it was noted that the Public Health groups had determined that the cancer rates were due largely to lifestyle factors. It was noted that although the Borough had seen an improvement Halton’s poor position was due to the rest of the country improving at a greater level.

RESOLVED: That the content of the report be accepted.