Agenda item

(To receive a report from Derek Ward, Director of Public Health, which provides the Committee with a definition of prevention and a summary of Public Health activities mapped against the three levels of prevention)

The committee received a presentation from the Director of Public Health, which provided an overview of prevention services for Lincolnshire, including:

• Population health management
• Signposting and advice
• NHS Health check programme
• One You Lincolnshire
• The Wellbeing Service
• Lincolnshire Community Equipment Service
• Remote monitoring
• Support to unpaid family carers
• Wider determinants of health
• Homes for Independence blueprint
• Centre for Ageing Better Rural Partnership

The committee welcomed the informative and interesting presentation and during the discussion the following points were noted:

• The committee thanked officers for their valuable work on prevention services.
• The committee were advised that Lucy Gavens, Consultant to Public Health, had recently been appointed as the lead officer for mental health for Lincolnshire and would work alongside the Lincolnshire Partnership NHS Fopundation Trust on preventing mental ill health.
• The population health management programme would connect data to better understand the experience of health and social care provided. A pilot programme of work would commence in October 2021 with a hope to have secured some early outcomes by December 2021. Findings of the pilot would be reported to the committee in 2022.
• As the integrated care system developed in 2022/23, population health management would form a fundamental aspect of public health within Lincolnshire.
• The diagram on page 22 of the report, which set out prevention and public health activities, had been circulated to partners.
• Public Health were working with the council's communications team to further public engagement and provide a variety of useful health information. Officers were looking to use infographics and videos as well as using TikTok, YouTube and other social media platforms to increase engagement.
• The occupational therapy service operated by Wellbeing Lincs was heavily subsidised by the council and therefore operated at a charge of only £2.50 per week to the user, the cost of which would not increase throughout the duration of the contract. The service would work with customers in financial difficulty and would not take enforcement action to recover monies if it was clear that individuals were in severe financial difficulty. The main priority of the service was to ensure that the most vulnerable were receiving the care they required.
• The Service Manager – Wellbeing Lincs emphasised that the service worked to empower the customer to address their own needs.
• The Wellbeing Lincs service worked to a seven day turnaround. However, if a customer had more in depth needs and required further assessment, the service would work directly with the occupational therapy team to put in place a temporary solution.
• Waiting lists for the service had decreased significantly. There was no national benchmarking data available but officers understood that Lincolnshire was high performing in comparison.
• Officers were investigating ways to relieve the pressures caused by the national shortage of occupational therapists. 
• A presentation on the Occupational Therapy service had been scheduled to be reported to the committee in December 2021.
• Over a twelve month period, the wellbeing service had reached around 7,000 people as well as providing covid-19 support to around 6,500 people.
• The committee highlighted the opportunity to collect abandoned health equipment for re-use, for both environmental and monetary value. It was suggested that household waste and recycling centres could be used as a collection point for equipment that was no longer used. Members were advised a number of solutions were being considered, with household waste and recycling centres being used as a short term solution. Officers emphasised the need for a long term solution which would target equipment on a daily basis and work to bring unused equipment back for re-use, supporting the increase in demand through a better recycling rate. It was agreed that this issue could be explored as part of the item on community equipment services, which had been listed for   the committee at its meeting in December 2021. 
• The council had been in contact with neighbouring councils and councils with a similar demographic to discuss the Homes for Independence Blueprint.
• The Centre for Ageing Better Rural Partnership was funded by a lottery grant and Lincolnshire County Council.
• In Lincolnshire, around a quarter of reception children were classed as obese, which increased to around a third by year 6. Around 60% of adults were also classed as being obese. These figures were in line with national averages.

RESOLVED:

            That the presentation and comments made be noted.