WIREDGOV

Health Innovation North West Coast co-delivered a one-day ‘hackathon’ to provide North West neighbourhood teams time and space to find solutions to tricky issues impacting their services.

The event, called Neighbourhoods First: Transforming Local Health and Care Together, welcomed 12 enthusiastic teams from Oldham, Stockport, Sefton, Wirral, Manchester, Trafford, Cheshire East, Cheshire West, Blackburn with Darwin, Hyndburn, Salford, and NHS Cheshire & Merseyside ICB.

Half of the teams looked at development of their neighbourhood teams and neighbourhood working in general. The other half looked at specific challenges, such as ‘frailty’, better non-urgent and primary care, and health promotion and prevention. A walk around the room indicated that some of the teams were just getting started, while others were maturing their services.

To begin the day, a panel of system leaders shared a number of inspirational insights. Panellists included:

• Dr Gunjit Bandesha, Director Healthcare Public Health, NHS England NW 
• Katie Egan, Integrated Care System Lead, Change Grow Live
• Mike Rose, Chair of Maundy Relief, Lancashire
• Cllr Keith Cunliffe, Portfolio for Health and Adult Social Care, NW and Wigan
• Mark Palethorpe, Chief Executive, St Helens Council
• Philippa (Pip) Morrant, Director of Community Services, Mid Cheshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust

Jen Kohan, Head of Programmes for the Coaching Academy, at Health Innovation North West Coast, designed and delivered the hackathon itself, providing teams with direction, resources, tips and words of encouragement. There were also a number of experts drafted in from other organisations and specialties, such as organisational development, digital and communications, who floated around the room offering teams advice.

Jen said:

“We immediately felt a warm and welcoming environment as soon as participants arrived. People left their ‘organisational hats’ at the door, which I think really helped them be open up to new ways of thinking and perspectives coming from the table and the wider room. We want to model this as the North West Collaborative. We are from six different organisations but it shouldn’t feel this way.”

View a video summary of the day and a visual representation of the day's outputs. 

Click here for the full press release