Consultation by Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust on management of neighbourhood healthcare teams aims to bring clinical expertise to the fore

A shake-up in the management strategy of the area’s crucial neighbourhood healthcare teams is currently underway across the county which will see clinical expertise a priority.

The neighbourhood teams provide joined-up care for patients and is made up of an array of different care givers, from district nurses to podiatrists and mental health practitioners.

A consultation by Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust is due to end next week which seeks to reduce the number of managers by creating new posts with each team having three clinical leaders, including one for nursing and one for mental health.

The changes will hopefully contribute around £500,000 towards savings following a £3million cut in the trust’s annual funding.

However, a spokesman for the trust said patients are unlikely to notice any difference with their care adding the aim is to provide more clinical expertise on the ground.

The spokesman for Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust said: “In the last three years, Neighbourhood Teams have ensured our patients, older people and those with long-term conditions, have received truly joined-up care from our dedicated staff.

“With demand continuing to increase and with the Trust’s older people’s community services required to make total savings of £3million this year, we need to continue to refine and improve the way we operate.

“To start to address this, we are currently consulting with some of our staff to review management support structures.

“We want to strengthen our clinical leadership by putting clinical expertise back into frontline care, whilst ensuring our staff continue to have the appropriate clinical support to do their jobs.

“Frontline patient services will not be affected by this consultation and, if the suggested proposals are adopted, we don’t anticipate any staff redundancies as we need to retain their expertise.”