Long Live the NHS
There has been a revolution in healthcare in the last fifty years driven by new technology such as hip replacements and chemotherapy and delivered by clinicians in the NHS. However it is now clear that the NHS cannot do everything and it is vitally important that it focuses on making the right diagnosis, providing acute care and starting the right treatment. But more than this is needed to prevent disease and to live well with one or more long term conditions. Once the right clinical treatment has been started, the most important type of care is self-care and the second most important type of care is that provided by other people in your family and community.
Furthermore, wellbeing is more than the absence of disease. Even when the best possible clinical treatment is being provided people need more than this to feel well. Some of the factors that affect wellbeing, for example low income and bad housing, of course require national political action. Even without this much can be done to support wellbeing by reducing isolation, engaging with others to improve the community in which we live and increasing levels of activity – not only physical but also activity of the brain and mind.
We work with others to develop and deliver services which are designed both to reduce the risk of disease and to help people adapt better after disease develops by
- Providing best current knowledge
- Offering and prescribing opportunities for activity, physical, cognitive and emotional
- Supporting the development of therapeutic communities both local and digital
Knowledge is the enemy of disease
There is a lot of information available, but this can lead to confusion and misunderstanding. We curate the best current knowledge and make is available to people based on their specific situation. Our aim is to give people the knowledge that they need to live longer better. This knowledge is taken from a wide range of sources such as:
- The NHS website
- the websites of the major healthcare charities
- the Cochrane Collaboration
- the Healthtalk website, which showcases a wide range of lived experience
Activity Prescriptions
We are working with the NHS and others to introduce Activity Prescriptions linked to, and sometimes instead of, drug prescriptions. These will be automatically created based on a person's diagnosis, NHS treatments and postcode. It will provide knowledge, motivation to put that knowledge into action and practical tools to do so including information about opportunities for physical, cognitive and emotional activity both local and digital.
Developing Therapeutic Communities
The world is changing and many of the pillars of local communities have become less visible but communities still exist and can be strengthened digitally. There are a number of important initiatives designed to use the power of the internet both to strengthen local communities and to create national communities of people with common needs and interests. These aim to reach and engage people both to help them to improve their own wellbeing and to offer opportunities for them to use their skills and experience to help others.