NHSProviders homepage

Delivering on ambitions for a neighbourhood health service

30 June 2025

A neighbourhood health service is key to unlocking the government’s ambitions for the NHS. 

At the NHS Providers Annual Conference and Exhibition in November 2024, Secretary of State for Health and Social Care Wes Streeting said a new neighbourhood health service would be focused on “building up community and primary care services with the explicit aim of keeping patients healthy and out of hospital, with care closer to home and in the home.”

In January 2025, NHS England published guidelines on neighbourhood health, asking systems to develop the foundations for neighbourhood working over the next year. The six core components outlined in the document – which include establishing integrated multi-disciplinary teams, offering urgent community-based services and improving access in general practice - are not new. However, delivering those components together, in every part of the country, would be. It would represent a powerful shift in the way people receive and experience care. 

This report features three case studies that show how trusts are already working at neighbourhood level to support people in a way that reduces pressures on other parts of the health and care system, and to improve patient experiences and outcomes.  

  • Surrey Downs – an evolving model of neighbourhood care enabled by formal structures and governance. 

  • North Central London Alliance – reshaping care in the community by rolling out integrated neighbourhood teams in Camden, designed with input from staff and local people.

  • Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland – providing mental health support in local communities, through close collaboration with the voluntary sector.

While this report spotlights a handful of examples, it is important to remember that there is innovative work taking place up and down the country. Indeed, Sandwell and West Birmingham Hospitals NHS Trust is reducing hospital admissions for older patients and improving urgent and emergency care performance through integrating services at neighbourhood-level. Likewise, University Hospitals Coventry and Warwickshire NHS Trust was recently commissioned by its local integrated care board (ICB) to act as a lead provider for community health services, and is now working with primary  and community care providers to improve and join up out of hospital care.

As these examples demonstrate, many NHS trusts and foundation trusts are already working with partners to deliver care at a neighbourhood level. To do this, they are co-designing service models with patients and communities,  building relationships with key partners including those in primary care and the voluntary sector, and engaging with local communities and staff. Robust governance models are emerging once the partnership working is established.