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Bay Health and Care Partners Stakeholder Newsletter Issue 7

4th January 2022

Welcome to the seventh edition of our Bay Health and Care Partners (BHCP) newsletter where we will update you every month on the collaborative work that is taking place in Morecambe Bay’s Place-Based Partnership and the outcomes and benefits for communities.

Across the system, colleagues are facing pressures. Lancashire County Council and the Homecare Agency is working with partners to tackle challenges within homecare services including staff shortages and self-isolation and the number of people needing homecare support. Short-term changes include prioritising calls for people with the highest level of needs. Our hospitals and community services are also experiencing extreme pressures and despite the extremely hard work of all of our teams, this has led to long delays in the Emergency Departments and difficulties discharging patients who are medically fit to be discharged but require further support at their place of residence (defined as not having criteria to reside). There is work ongoing to reduce the pressure on teams and services including avoiding admissions, reducing length of stay, making the best use of capacity in our hospitals and accelerating transfers of care to the community/home.

Despite the pressures BHCP have faced due to coronavirus (COVID-19) and challenges faced across health, care and in the community, the Partners continue to work together to ensure that services keep improving in areas such as urology, stroke, mental health and frailty so that they are as safe as possible for patients, service users, families and colleagues for years to come. You can find out the latest updates about coronavirus, the Omicron variant and the latest restrictions here.

Looking forward to this year we are excited to see how the Place-Based Partnership development programme for 2021/2022 progresses and that good practice continues to be shared across BHCP. You may remember we announced in Issue 4 that there had been a change in terminology to describe Bay Health and Care Partners and the other four partnerships (Pennine Lancashire, Fylde Coast, West Lancashire and Central Lancashire) in our region. Short videos are being developed to help support the understanding of Place-Based Partnerships which will be available shortly. Please do take the time to visit the BHCP website here to find out more. We would encourage you to share these links and the videos once available within your organisations and your communities.

Dr Geoff Jolliffe and Prof Mike Thomas, Joint Chairs for BHCP

Partners transforming services

Every month we will explore a different area of our programmes of work that are transforming services. This month we are highlighting work that is ongoing to improve stroke services. A stroke dashboard has been developed to provide an overview of patients who have suffered a stroke, or suspected stroke, across Morecambe Bay. The dashboard pulls data from a number of sources to provide a single point of reference, which helps colleagues in managing the patient journey from arrival at one of the Emergency Departments to completing the necessary scans and onto one of our wards. You can find out more by watching the following video at the BHCP YouTube site here.

Listening to our communities

We will listen to the voices of our communities and involve them in the development of services. Here we will highlight the work that is ongoing to engage with people across the Bay. In this edition, we focus on a report of a community engagement weekend (Greaves/Scotforth West) led by the Cornerstone in Lancaster, partners and community groups. The report outlines some of the key findings drawn out from recent conversations, listening and activities based at Scotforth Road.


Our GPs are an important part of Bay Health Care Partners and here our GPs and primary care colleagues have the opportunity to talk about issues and specialties that they are working on or interested in. This month, Dr Arun Thimmiah shares tips on how to stay well this winter including how to keep your safe during adverse weather conditions and less daylight time and how to avoid slips, trips and falls. You can read the full feature at the BHCP website here.


The Cornerstone is working with the community of Greaves towards a more equitable neighbourhood, identifying and growing existing strengths of residents towards better outcomes across the area in terms of health and wellbeing for all which builds upon the Cornerstone's 'Fullness of Life' strategy. You can read the full report on the BHCP website here.

GP focus with Dr Arun Thimmiah

Our GPs are an important part of Bay Health Care Partners and here our GPs and primary care colleagues have the opportunity to talk about issues and specialties that they are working on or interested in. This month, Dr Arun Thimmiah shares tips on how to stay well this winter including how to keep your safe during adverse weather conditions and less daylight time and how to avoid slips, trips and falls. You can read the full feature at the BHCP website here.

The spotlight on…

Every month we will feature a different voluntary, community or faith sector organisation across the Bay. This time the spotlight is on…Green Recovery for Morecambe Bay’s Woodland Project Butterfly Conservation.


Green Recovery for Morecambe Bay's Woodland Project Butterfly Conservation wants to offer opportunities to groups and individuals within the Morecambe Bay area who don't usually have access to nature to come out and carry out woodland management work, not only to benefit the local nature but also to benefit their mental and physical health and help combat loneliness and isolation. You can read the full case study at the BHCP website here.

Celebrating our teams

There are a variety of roles across BHCP and other organisations we work with in the community. Here we shine the spotlight on the people who carry out a range of roles to keep our communities healthy and supported.


Caroline Elliott volunteered as a Covid Marshal at Kendal Vaccination Centre for five months before embarking on a career with North West Ambulance Service (NWAS) as an Emergency Medical Technician 1 Apprentice. Here Caroline tells us more about the role she undertook as Covid Marshal and her new role with NWAS. You can read the full case study at the BHCP website here.

ICCs update

Our Integrated Care Communities (ICCs) are integrated teams of health and care workers, voluntary organisations and wider community assets who work together to aim to improve physical and mental health outcomes, promote wellbeing and reduce health inequalities across an entire population. In this edition, we look at how swimming lessons are helping Carnforth residents adversely affected by the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. Participants were identified by Ash Trees Surgery and referred to the pilot sessions led by a professional swimming teacher at Carnforth Community Swimming Pool. You can read the full story at the BHCP website here. The latest editions of the ICCs' newsletters can be read here.

Top stories from our Partners

Thank you for reading our latest edition!

This newsletter is produced by the BHCP Comms and Engagement Team. If you would like to submit a story please contact Michelle Jordan, Ivan Drozdov and Karen Evans at BHCP.Communcations@mbht.nhs.uk 

You can sign up for the newsletter here or send us any feedback on it here.

You can find a PDF version of this edition of the newsletter at the 'Bay Health and Care Partners Newsletters' section of the website by clicking here.

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