PLANNING
IT’S ALL IN THE PLANNING...
COMMUNITY PLANNING IS ONE OF THE NEW POWERS WHICH TRANSFERRED TO NI’S COUNCILS IN APRIL OF LAST YEAR. WILLIE MCCAUGHEY, BUSINESS MANAGER AT KELLS AND CONNOR PHARMACY - AND A LOCAL COUNCILLOR - TELLS US HOW THE PATIENT WILL DEFINITELY BE THE WINNER IN THIS PROCESS...
A
t the heart of community planning is the idea that decision making is brought
closer to the community, and that, in doing so, service delivery is improved and better outcomes are achieved.
When I became a local Councillor two years ago, I knew exactly in which area of council I wanted to be most active – Community Planning. Based as I am in Kells and Connor Pharmacy, which services two small villages, you get a unique perspective on what is going right in healthcare, what is not being delivered, and, most importantly, what people in general and patients in particular are thinking.
58 - PHARMACY IN FOCUS
When it comes to community planning, therefore, it’s very clear that health is going to be one of the major drivers, and I knew from the outset that I wanted to be involved in what is a new and exciting way of delivering evidence-based services.
The fact that NI councils will now be partnering with health and social care, education and with bodies such as the Public Health Agency means that there will be a degree of hitherto unseen wide-ranging engagement. Previously, groups would have discussed community planning with local councils etc, but didn’t have to engage meaningfully. Now, thanks to new legislation, they must engage
with councils as an equal partner and this is what will make the difference.
WORKING IN PARTNERSHIP My council – Mid and East Antrim – is currently working together with other organisations and groups to form a partnership and to develop a long- term Community Plan for the area. These groups include the Northern Trust, the Housing Executive, the PSNI, Northern Regional College and community groups, such as the Mid and East Antrim Inter-ethnic Forum.
Mid and East Antrim Council wanted service delivery to be have an evidence based approach rather than a perceived one. To do this, council has gathered factual evidence from
many sources and mapped this across our boundary area. This mapping is time consuming and a never ending process but a recent visit by councillors to North Ayreshire proved beyond doubt that it was the best approach to take. If council gathered and collated the evidence correctly, it would allow specifi c resources to be targeted into specifi c areas to deliver measurable community improvement outcomes.
The early drivers became very obvious very quickly. For a start, we were all very aware that, with the ageing population, elderly needs needed to be delivered on.
As a member of a community pharmacy team, I was also probably more aware than many as to how much of a problem depression – and other mental health issues – are in our society today.
WHAT AND HOW TO PRIORITISE Once we had ascertained that these would be two areas in which we
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