Agenda and draft minutes

To confirm the minutes from the previous meeting

The minutes of the meeting on 11 March 2015 OS/084/15 were altered to have ‘Herts Valley Conditioning update’ amended to read ‘Herts Valley Commissioning Update’ in the minutes

With this amendment the minutes were confirmed by the members present and then signed by the chairman.

To receive any apologies for absence

Apologies for absence were received on behalf of Councillor Harden and Mike Moore.

To receive any declarations of interest

A member with a disclosable pecuniary interest or a personal interest in a matter who attends a meeting of the authority at which the matter is considered -

(i)            must disclose the interest at the start of the meeting or when the interest becomes apparent

and, if the interest is a disclosable pecuniary interest, or a personal interest which is also prejudicial

(ii)           may not participate in any discussion or vote on the matter (and must withdraw to the public seating area) unless they have been granted a dispensation.

A member who discloses at a meeting a disclosable pecuniary interest which is not registered in the Members’ Register of Interests, or is not the subject of a pending notification, must notify the Monitoring Officer of the interest within 28 days of the disclosure.

Disclosable pecuniary interests, personal and prejudicial interests are defined in Part 2 of the Code of Conduct For Members

[If a member is in any doubt as to whether they have an interest which should be declared they should seek the advice of the Monitoring Officer before the start of the meeting]

There were no declarations of interest

An opportunity for members of the public to make statements or ask questions in accordance with the rules as to public participation

There was no public participation.

The Chair explained to the new Members of the committee that this item is used as a regular item on the agenda to voice any concerns that they may have on their wards. Any items raised will be discussed at this point of the agenda.

Councillor Timmis referred to an issue in the Watling ward – Markyate Surgery. She mentioned that planning permission had been granted for the new surgery to be built in the Hicks Road Development and S106 agreed. She mentioned that the lease on the surgery finishes in 2017 and there has been complete silence from NHS England and Dacorum Borough Council regarding the design of the surgery and whether it is appropriate.  Councillor Timmis added that there was no provision for disabled parking and lots of empty spaces not being utilised and would like to know what is happening.

There were no further issues to add.

Action:

1.    L Collins to liaise with the planning department to see if the planning permission meets all of the parking guidelines.

2.    T Fernandes said that he would liaise with the Premise’s Team at NHS England and Dr Sephai and ask them to look into the query.

This item was deferred to the next Health in Dacorum meeting on 9^th December 2015.

Dr Trevor Fernandes, Herts Valleys Clinical Commissioning Group presented the committee with an update since the last meeting.

Dr Fernandes said that the CCG has engaged with a lot of public and practises and providers and there are lots of events coming up. The aim is to come up with structures and systems in the Health service for the whole of West Hertfordshire that are sustainable for the future and offer the best possible care to patients. He mentioned that there will be a review taking place on Friday detailing out the findings which he will share with the committee once there is an update. The meeting taking place will liaise with the providers; the acute hospitals, the community provider, HCT and Herts County Council whereby all the main stake holders will decide the next steps. Once the proposals have been put forward and agreed they will launch “Case for Change”.

Throughout the country, a stake holder survey was held in March. This entails reviews from practises, acute trusts and patient representatives who comment on how the business is carried out and whether they are consulted with. The results showed that there had been an overall improvement and they were above average on the CCG over the last year.

·            There will be a quarterly review held for the NHS England. The last review was 3 months ago which showed that there was a couple of issues at that point, balancing the budget and finances, targets centrally driven, increased diagnosis on Dementia and also the referral to Mental Health. 

·            As of March 2015, the financial target was met with a 1% surplus (7 million Surplus) which will get carried forward onto the following year.

·            Referrals target was also met for the last financial quarter.

·            There are 3 million unidentified savings yet to be made within the Health Service over the next 3 months.

·            The Emergency care is below current standards.

Questions and answers

B Harris made reference to people being cared for in their own homes and asked how carers are currently being recruited.

T Fernandes explained that Hertfordshire County Council have plans in place for home care services to make sure there are improvements in the health system.

Councillor C Wyatt – Lowe mentioned that Hertfordshire County Council had recently re-procured the home care service and it had been a very successful operation so far making better uses of the resources they have. This week is “Good Care week” and there have been several events taking place designed to encourage local people to come into Care profession. It has been very low status but this has been addressed. In order to attract people the new Hertfordshire care quality standard that is part of the procurement has been put in place to make sure that people are taking the tendering contracts. The providers had to show that they could roster their services properly. She added that these messages need to be place in order to stimulate health care across  ...  view the full minutes text for item 7.

Councillor W Wyatt – Lowe asked Members if they were aware of the recent CQC event that had taken place and asked if they had any questions.

Questions and answers

T Carter mentioned that the CQC inspections have been within the secondary care now for a number of years and the new inspection process started about two years ago with West Hertfordshire Hospital was recently inspected on the 13^th April 2015. 67 inspectors visited them over a period of 4 days carrying out several unannounced visits. Once the final report comes through, depending on the outcome, you can be re-inspected and have further unannounced visits.

Councillor W Wyatt-Lowe asked if the extension from the secondary care into the grammer care is actually worthwhile and will have the same kind of benefits.

T Carter said that it can have some benefits. It is relatively new into the community setting and now that the inspections are much more rounded, there will be a more involved process whereby there will be meetings with the public, Health watch, drop in sessions etc.

The Chair asked Dr Fernandes if it would be beneficial to the committee to have the CQC item put on the agenda to discuss the outcomes and updates that take place with the recent inspections.

Dr Fernandes said that the initial feedback that he has received is that it has been very good. Once all of the processes have been through all of the practises, the CCG will be collating all of the figures on the outcomes. He suggested that a review be held in 6 months with an update.

The Chair suggested that Dr Fernandes brings back to the meeting in December 2015 an update on the CQC in his next report.

Councillor Hicks made reference to Community Cardiology and asked if this meant moving out of the hospital and into the GP surgery.

Dr Fernandes said that Cardiology was a big spectrum affair and patients would not be brought out into the community with life threatening conditions such as heart attacks. Some of the earlier investigations will be looked at more closely to home.

Councillor Timmis made reference to the transforming of Adult Community Services and asked if they would consider transforming the way they communicate and information given to carers and patients about what’s happening and why.

T Carter confirmed that they are working with the sector as part of the system resilience, to look at people’s pathways to look at the information required. She mentioned that they are currently looking at Community health assessments and Social Care assessments and the sort of package care that people require. A huge amount of work is being carried out with the CCG and Mental Health, Community Services.

T Fernandes referred to Councillors Timmis’ earlier question and said that this is an ongoing issue in the health service. The care of the patients will be handled better and there will be a less pressured environment for all.

Councillor Timmis declared  ...  view the full minutes text for item 8.

Councillor W Wyatt- Lowe mentioned to the new Members on the committees that he is part of the public health monitoring panel at County and he reports on any meetings that they have had. The last meeting held was in May and one of the papers discussed was about the Harvard Campaign and talking about the various ways of HIV protection and the various ways of doing this. One new suggestion was a testing kit. The aim of public health is to prevent people from needing the other services that health provide and the objection is to provide the service that Hertfordshire is covering everything that it should and look at new ways of delivering.

Councillor W Wyatt – Lowe welcomed the committee’s suggestions as to how we can approach people who are the type of community for HIV testing. He also mentioned that the obesity levels are dropping in Hertfordshire but won’t know the effects of the pilots until 2017/18.

Questions and answers

B Harris asked if the manufactures for food suppliers have been contacted with regards to the amount of sugar currently in kid’s soft drinks etc.

Councillor W Wyatt-Lowe said that this was more of a national issue rather than a County Council one. However he would look into this as this is an ongoing issue raised at this meeting.

Councillor Hicks asked how the BMI if a child is calculated.

Councillor W Wyatt – Lowe said that the calculation of the BMI of a child is a simplistic measure which includes measuring their height, weight etc.

Councillor Timmis suggested that it may be useful to have information on the inside of toilets such as schools, pubs etc regarding HIV testing. She said that this may be one effective way of getting the HIV testing kits publicized.

Councillor W Wyatt – Lowe said that he like the idea of taking the information regarding the HIV testing kits out to other organisations.

Resolved:

The report was noted.

Stephanie Johnston, Cancer Programme Leader and Tracey Carter, Chief Nurse & Director of Infection, Prevention and Control presented the committee with an update on the latest Cancer Review in West Hertfordshire since the last meeting.

·        Signed off the recovery plans with the trust development authority and the CCG, to sign up to the delivery of performance for 62 days by the end of Q1.

·        Priorities are around access for patients so that patients can be seen quickly, meet Cancer standards, recovery plans in place not just at Trust level but at speciality level.

·        A lot of focus on quality of services -  listening to what patients are saying

·        Many services within the trust are to be reviewed at the end of the month

·        There are many issues with the administration and the IT services in the hospital, but more is being done to overcome these problematic areas.

·        There has been improvement’s on the Lung Cancer data which was recently submitted.

·        Patient safety – making sure that there are structures in place with risk; reporting incidents, making sure all staff are trained and that they have policies to adhere to.

·        All of the patients on pathways are reviewed every day, every week and at a weekly meeting.

·        There is a Cancer forum which is clinically led and has representation from the CCG’s to enable them to discuss issues and strategy on a quarterly basis.

·        There is a review set up for patients that have waited over a period of 100 days. There is an arrangement now with the CCG to review these patients on a regular basis. As a result of this review the numbers have been dramatically reduced.

Questions and answers

Resolved

The report was noted.

The date of the next meeting is on Wednesday 9^th September 2015.