Positive change and impact

Reducing inpatient bed use and out of area placements 

Since its inception in 2020, North London Forensic Collaborative (NLFC) has delivered a programme of work aimed at achieving the national targets set out in the NHS Long Term Plan with a specific focus on reducing the number of inpatient beds and creating specialist community services.

This has resulted in a 60% reduction in the number of adult secure placements outside of London, and a 63% reduction in out of London placements for patients with a learning disability and autism.

NLFC leadership team believe they have had the greatest impact in their community transformation work which has significantly reduced their reliance on inpatient beds, with a 12% reduction over the past three years.

This has released funding which they have been able to reinvest into community services every year. As a result, NLFC now has specialist forensic community services across each integrated care system (ICS) for both adult secure patients and individuals with a learning disability or autism who are in the system.

Other areas of impact

Further examples of the impact of NLFC include:

• Creation of 150 new posts working with more than 600 service users in specialist community forensic teams.
• Three new community forensic learning disability teams creating 70 new posts.
• A new ward of 16 beds for prison admissions to address waiting times.
• System-wide review in response to Edenfield leading to an improved standard of in person advocacy available on every ward every week.
• Creation of a voluntary, charity and social enterprise grant scheme, which aims to advance equalities and deliver employment opportunities.
• Investment in a physical health model of care aiming to reduce health inequalities focusing on obesity, smoking, substance misuse and cardiovascular diseases.
• Collaborative research network to build an evidence base, evaluate services and conduct epidemiological research.