Key role for community services in reducing emergency admissions
08 June 2018
- The Public Accounts Committee publishes a new report on reducing emergency admissions in NHS hospitals
- The report finds that nearly 1.5 million emergency admissions could be avoidable if services were working together more effectively
- We highlight our recent report which shows that support on the ground for community services has failed to match the rhetoric
The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) has published its report on reducing emergency admissions.
The report found that nearly 1.5 million people could have avoided emergency admissions in 2016–17 if hospitals, GPs, community services and social care had worked together more effectively.
The Committee calls on NHS England to deliver on its five-year plan to move care into the community and out of hospitals.
Responding, the deputy chief executive of NHS Providers, Saffron Cordery, said:
“We welcome the PAC’s findings on reducing emergency admissions.
“Our recent report showed how repeated promises to bring more patient care closer to home by prioritising NHS community services have fallen flat.
Our recent report showed how repeated promises to bring more patient care closer to home by prioritising NHS community services have fallen flat.
“We know that the NHS must do more to help people stay well in their own homes and communities, avoiding the need for hospital treatment, if the health service is going to be financially sustainable.
“This is not just about a growing and ageing population with more complex conditions. It is also because thanks to advances in care and treatment, it is now possible to look after people at home who, ten or twenty years ago, would have needed to stay in hospital.
“Yet our survey of NHS trust leaders showed support on the ground for community services has failed to match the rhetoric, leaving many providers marginalised, underfunded and short staffed.
“Community services are the glue that holds the different parts of the health and care system together.
Community services are the glue that holds the different parts of the health and care system together.
"Trusts have demonstrated how, with the right support, they can transform the way care is delivered, meeting the needs of local people, keeping them well, helping them live independently even with serious conditions, and easing pressures on other services.
“We need to seize the opportunities presented by the push for integrated care and the Prime Minister’s commitment to increase long term health and care funding to make good on past promises, and bring NHS community services centre stage.”