Better Care Together partner with the Healthwatch Chatty Van

26th February 2018
Better Care Together partner with the Healthwatch Chatty Van thumbnail image

Members of the public and staff across the Morecambe Bay area are being asked to contribute their thoughts on health and care as part of a ground-breaking series of events from February 26th to March 13th.

In association with Cumbria Healthwatch and Lancashire Healthwatch, Bay Health & Care Partners will be using the innovative ‘chatty van,’ which will visit nine locations across Morecambe Bay.

For the past three years the region has been working as one of the 50 national Vanguard health systems, delivering new models of care.

During this time, many new ways of working have been implemented, reducing the numbers of people attending hospital, providing more care closer to people’s homes and integrating care across different organisations to make care less complicated and delivered in or nearer people’s homes.

This year the hospital Trust and Morecambe Bay Clinical Commissioning Group are on target to make £30million savings – despite these successes, the health system across the Bay is being challenged to make further savings to live within its budget.

Andrew Bennett, Chief Officer, Morecambe Bay Clinical Commissioning Group said: “We have come a long way in a short period of time, but we’re being challenged to go even further and at a faster pace.

“In addition we need to plan for the future health needs of our local population, address rising demand, and changes in technology and gaps in the workforce.

“It will also not come as a surprise to learn our financial position has deteriorated as funding levels have got tighter. It is still costing us more to deliver local healthcare across Morecambe Bay than we receive. For every £1.00 the Morecambe Bay health system receives, we are spending £1.20".

Dame Jackie Daniel, Chief Executive, University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay Foundation Trust said, “We have no plans to close any of our hospitals or to reduce the overall number of clinical staff. They are a vital part of the health system, however to keep pace with change and demand, the services delivered in our hospitals and communities may change in the future.

“Before we became a Vanguard we spoke at length to the public to ensure that they were able to contribute to our Better Care Together Clinical Strategy.

We believe we can continue to make the savings without affecting the safety and good quality of the care we provide, we need to talk to the public in an extensive way again to ensure they can feedback their views on the work we are doing and our thoughts for the future.

We want to hear the public’s thoughts and hope as many people as possible can contribute through the Chatty Van visits across the Bay, via a paper or on-line survey, or emailing their feedback via the Better Care Together website.”


Chatty Van dates and locations


If you are unable to attend any of the Chatty Van sessions you can take part in a survey – the survey will open on 26 February and will close on Sunday March 18th at midnight and can be found here. If you would prefer a paper copy please call 01524 518638. You can also email your comments via bettercaretogether@mbht.nhs.uk. You can also log your comments via Twitter using the hashtag #bctchattyvan or log your comment on the Facebook page.

Return to header