Foreword
Last spring we published our vision for improving health and healthcare in Yorkshire and the Humber. It was the culmination of many clinicians from across Yorkshire and the Humber working to identify what excellent care and services would look like and what we needed to do to improve current services to meet those high standards.
Many people supported and shared our ambitions. But people also asked us how was it going to happen. What will be different this time?
Building and sustaining clinical engagement and leadership is critical to success. So is the need to work with all our partners who have a role and interest in improving health. That happens best at a local level and implementation of most of Healthy Ambitions will happen as a result, not of any regional work, but of local strategies for improvement and local plans which reflect the specific needs of those communities.
As local and regional leaders of the NHS we have set out our approach to implementation and how we have balanced the need for local freedom with the assurance required that action is underway. We know we need not just a vision, but a road map of how we are going to get there. So this document describes how the SHA set about, with the 14 primary care trusts in Yorkshire and the Humber and our clinical leads, designing our approach to implementation. It has been tested with a wide range of colleagues and we have gathered extensive feedback from organisations across Yorkshire and the Humber.
We know there is much more to do but we want to make progress in the next twelve months on some very specific areas – on improving stroke care, on improving maternity and neonatal care, on beginning the long journey to halt the rise of obesity in Yorkshire and the Humber. The list goes on. I hope this document will give every reader confidence that we are not just ambitious for the health of our population, we intend to realise those ambitions.
Margaret Edwards
Chief Executive
NHS Yorkshire and the Humber
Chris Welsh
Medical Director
NHS Yorkshire and the Humber