Now the NHS has turned 70, and with the Government preparing a long-term plan for the service in England, a broad range of leaders in charities and voice organisations have come together to offer our views on what should happen next to improve health and care – within the NHS and beyond.
Over a period of two years, National Voices, Volunteering Matters and NAVCA have worked with in nine areas of England to raise awareness of the importance of local voluntary and community organisations in the personalisation of health and care services, particularly their role in enabling people to access and make effective use of Personal Health Budgets (PHBs).
Policy makers have been aspiring to a ‘patient-centred NHS’ in England for at least 20 years. Person-centred care has become an increasingly prominent stated ambition both of national policy and local practice.
What difference, if any, have these stated ambitions made to the experiences of people who need and use services and support? We wanted to know.
This publication, created by National Voices, Shared Lives Plus, TLAP and In Control, outlines personal health budgets as an integral form of NHS care and an effective method of personalisation.
There is growing evidence that personal budgets can be an effective, valued and value for money mechanism to improve the quality of life of people with long term conditions, and their experience of care and support services. Despite this, some commentators have expressed concerns about the use of personal budgets within the NHS.
Direct negotiations between the UK and the EU have started. The negotiators now meet for one week every month to work through a sequence of issues.
National Voices is a member of the Brexit Health Alliance, a group of organisations convened by the NHS Confederation and including industry, professional bodies and patient organisations.
The Board of NHS England has launched a public consultation, which will result in statutory guidance to Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs), aimed at restricting the prescribing of treatments and remedies that are judged to be of ‘low clinical value’.
National Voices, the coalition of health and care charities, has a number of concerns about the nature of this consultation process. These are set out in a position statement on 'low value' prescriptions.
In June 2014, National Voices set out to explore and test how communities of practice could facilitate the spread of large-scale change across England’s voluntary sector working for health and wellbeing.
This publication reflects on our experiences over the last 3 years, and in the spirit of communities of practice, aims to share reflections in order that others can use our learning.
National Voices and Social Enterprise UK have conducted a survey of NHS Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) to assess their use of the Social Value Act.
The Public Services (Social Value) Act 2012 requires commissioners to consider broader social, economic and environmental benefits to their area when making commissioning decisions. It was a response to the risk of competitive tendering focusing solely on cost at the expense of other forms of value.
A series of member briefings from National Voices summarising the health and care aspects of political party manifestos in the build up to the 2017 General Election.
As the parties battle for votes, we will cut through the headlines and assess the implications of each party’s manifesto pledges relating to health and care.
As the coalition of health and care charities in England, National Voices will publish briefings on the Conservative, Labour and Liberal Democrat manifestos as they are published. All will be published on this page.
Ahead of the 2017 General Election, National Voices members have worked together to develop a list of priority actions for the new government to meet the challenges facing health and care.
Aimed at political parties contesting the General Election, the document outlines the need for health and care services which put people first, helping people be partners in decisions about their health and care and making better use of the resources in communities and the voluntary sector.
