CHARITIES
Charities can shape the future of NHS care
Professor Philip Sugarman, chief executive of St Andrew’s Healthcare, welcomes the Secretary of State’s vision for the integral part charitable providers can play in the future of public healthcare.
here are so many fantastic charities providing healthcare in this country – think of Macmillan for example. St Andrew’s, the UK’s largest mental healthcare charity, also cares for some of the most vulnerable people.
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We provide specialist services to the NHS across England, which include mental health, learning disability, autism, brain injury, Huntington’s, Alzheimer’s and a se- ries of national specialist services for men, women, adolescents and elders.
The Secretary of State recently opened our newest medium secure mental health ser- vice for men in Northampton. At William Wake House we provide national specialist services which include dedicated units for the deaf, for brain injury, and for young adults. Last month he praised St Andrew’s in the House of Commons as a charitable model for the future of NHS care. He told his fellow MPs that the new facility “...will provide first-rate, state-of-the-art care for mental health patients”.
This has always been our aim, since being founded as a charity in 1838. Our mission is to provide benefit to the public, not only by giving excellent care and treatment in the best possible environment, but also by un-
66 | national health executive Mar/Apr 12
dertaking research and delivering training. St Andrew’s has become the first national specialist teaching hospital in the charity sector, supported by leading universities such as King’s College London. Our aca- demic staff published almost 70 papers last year, and they have a strong emphasis on evidence-based outcomes.
So, from our perspective, as a teaching hos- pital, a research hub and a centre of excel- lence, with Governors and members, we believe we look very much like a founda- tion trust. Alternatively, you could say that NHS providers increasingly look like not- for-profit social enterprises. Either way, we are all truly becoming part of a larger NHS family.
With NHS budgets constrained, a longer- lived population and the cost of care in- evitably increasing, innovation is the only way we can deliver the right services to the people who need them. That’s what we are all involved in healthcare to achieve.
The important thing about our status as a charity is that we reinvest our funding in care and treatment, including developing brand new services. Over the last ten years the charity has invested £200m in new award-winning facilities that provide NHS
patients with the best new choices for their treatment in excellent care environments.
The goal for most people in our care is to regain their health and well-being in the community. Shorter lengths of stay in spe- cialist services are in everyone’s interest. To help achieve this we focus on our service user’s views. This has enabled us to lead national published research on key tools such as the widely-used ‘Recovery Star’. It is also why we were recently chosen by the Department of Health to be included as a centre for its Implementing Recovery pro- gramme.
Our charity believes passionately in being positive about what can be achieved for our service users and in making a major con- tribution to the future of the NHS.
Prof Philip Sugarman FOR MORE INFORMATION
To find out more about St Andrew’s services, conferences and events this year or to speak to someone in detail about how charitable providers complement NHS services: E:
communications@standrew.co.uk W:
www.stah.org
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