Leading not-for-profit care and support organisation, the National Care Forum [NCF], has joined up with the Health Service Journal [HSJ] to form a series of articles alongside senior NHS leaders, which will highlight some of the major challenges facing the care industry.
A lack of investment in care and consecutive governments’ inability to reform social care has left the sector in a state of crisis. This has now boiled over to the point where there is a clear and serious knock-on effect for the NHS.
If there is one truth that all NHS leaders have come to understand during the last few years, it is that the service’s fate is irrevocably linked with that of the care sector. However, busy NHS leaders must develop the deep understanding of the care sector that the current environment demands.
To address this, the Health Service Journal- an online publication aimed at senior management, decision-makers and policy makers in the UK healthcare industry - asked the NCF to commission a series of articles exploring the current challenges facing the care sector, and to suggest ways in which the NHS could become a more integral partner.
Across the week, these articles will be presented on the HSJ website. The first article in the series is penned by Professor Vic Rayner, CEO of the NCF, and explores why social care should be for people, not for profit.
Commenting on the collaboration with HSJ, Professor Rayner said: “It is essential for NHS leaders to recognise the significance of the relationship between health and care. It can be very easy for care and support to be represented as less important to people and as a consequence less important to fund than other core public services such as health or education, but social care is a public service that people want and expect within their communities.
“We are very excited to be collaborating with HSJ to present dedicated articles from across the care sector that shine a light on the important issues facing social care providers and what more could be done by working closer with our health colleagues to create better outcomes for people.
“Every day throughout the week there will be a number of articles published on different themes from delegated healthcare by chief nurse for adult social care, Deborah Sturdy to a day in the life of a CEO in adult social care; a closer look at Integrated Care Systems and how this model of integration could be opportunity to join up services to a reflection on the lived experience of someone drawing on health and social care.”
The articles are available to access freely on the HSJ website here.
Image by Avery Healthcare - Own work, on Wikimedia Commons
