Berkshire West CCG Meets at 9.30 Tuesday 12th June 2018, Oakwood Centre

The new unified Berkshire West CCG holds its first Goverrning Body meeting in public at the Oakwood Centre, Headley Road, Woodley, RG5 4JA at 9.30-12.30 on Tuesday 12th June 2018. Please register to attend.

Agenda and papers can be found below. Please send public questions to ppiteam.berkshirewest@nhs.net.

Public Questions and CCG Answers at the Meeting

Tom Lake asked three written questions:

  1. [Question] What is the reason for the large discrepancy between the targets for West Berkshire and Reading on Delayed Transfers of Care - considering that the populations and numbers of deaths in the populations are roughly equal?

    Surely nearness to death is more telling that age as a measure of frailty and so mortalities should be considered more significant than age profiles in assessing targets?

    [Added explantory note] The targets are 621 for Reading and 767 for West Berks - days of additional hospital stay per quarter. Reading has a somewhat younger age profile than West Berkshire but high mortality for a deprived portion of the population.

    [Answer] The DToC targets were calculated using an NHS England methodology and agreed between the Local Authorities and NHS England. The CCG is therefore unable to comment on the variance between the Reading and West Berkshire targets

  2. [Question] What can be the cause of the marked drop in early detection of cancers in both N&W and S Readingin 2016-7 (latest figures)? Is it statistically significant? Surely this sudden change cannot be attributed to "hard to reach" communities and must be regarded as systemic? What remedial action is proposed?

    [Added explanatory note] The proportions of diagnosed cancers detected early are given as: (N&W Reading) q1 54.5% q2 56.0% q3 56.4% q4 44.2% (South Reading) q1 56.5% q2 64.6% q3 50.0% q4 44.1%

    [Answer] (We are still waiting for an answer to this question from the appropriate Team. An email response will be provided once an answer has been provided.)

  3. [Question] A locality chair report refers to the ICS Operational Plan being finalised and submitted to NHS England in April. When will it be published? Why not at this meeting?

    [Answer] We are awaiting confirmation from NHS England that the plan has been approved and can be published. This is the same approach that has been taken to planning in all previous years that the CCG has been in operation.

    [Point made in discussion] Cathy Winfield and Sam Burrows agreed that NHS England had not dealt with the narrative of the plan promptly although the financial plan had been accepted. They agreed that a deadline (10 days?) should be set for NHS England response after which the plan would be published.

Leslie MacDonald (chair of Reading Mencap) pressed Cathy Winfield to give an assurance that the forthcoming overhaul of the commissioning of the voluntary sector would be fully in place by next financial year and that it would be based on co-production - an assurance which was apparently given.