Integrated Care Systems were created to help everyone involved in supporting health and care work together better.  National guidance was published about how we should work in partnership with our people and communities. Listening to the lived experience of the people and communities in Norfolk and Waveney is vital in helping people live longer, healthier and happier lives.  It also helps us make sure that the care and support offered in Norfolk and Waveney is designed around our population.

The overarching vision for working with people and communities in Norfolk and Waveney is that people with lived experience tell their story once and it is heard across the ICS, with all partner organisations consistently working together, with the public, to share insight and learning. This will maximise resources and ensure that the voice of local people, especially some of our more quieter voices are heard and shared as widely as possible.

Our approach was first published in March 2022 and was tested with our local people and partners and received very positive feedback from NHS England and singles us out as a national exemplar for our work with inclusion health groups. You can read the full feedback from NHS England here.

Here you can read the current version of our draft Working with People and Communities approach or the Easy Read summary. This will continue to develop and adapt, to reflect local aspirations as needed.

The Ten Principles

We will work towards the following 10 principles from national ICS guidance when working with people and communities at neighbourhood, place and system level.  These will be tested with local people as this approach develops and adapted to reflect local aspirations and our 5-Year Joint Forward Plan as needed. 

Health Inequalities and Quieter Voices

We learnt during the COVID-19 pandemic that we need to listen more carefully to what really matters to our people and communities, especially if we are going to address health inequalities.  A really effective way to do that is to use trusted communicators, people who are part of the local community – ‘people like me’. A good way to do that is by working with Voluntary, Community & Social Enterprise (VCSE) organisations who already have long standing relationships and networks throughout Norfolk and Waveney. This is the approach being developed by the Norfolk and Waveney Community Voices Programme.

Norfolk and Waveney ICS is working to draw together the various sources of data available within the system.  Building on existing Public Health guidance, this will drive much of the ICS activity and will go a long way towards identifying need.  Through working with people and communities we want to use the people’s voice to test and assure the data is reflecting what matters to local people.  This will enable us to move beyond information about ‘treatment’ & ‘services’ to hear people’s whole lived experience.

Co-production

Co-production refers to a process of shared power to effect change.  The term co-production is generally used to mean an end-to-end process where people with lived experience work with those who design services and projects in an equal partnership, sharing power and often involving a significant commitment and where involvement fees or other forms of reciprocity are offered alongside expenses. 

Examples of co-production do exist in Norfolk and Waveney and work is underway within the system to align existing work and develop a shared approach.  A co-production hub has been developed as part of our people and communities hub to share examples from the system, to promote co-production principles and to signpost to support materials.

People and Communities – Governance

The Patients and Communities Committee provides NHS Norfolk and Waveney with assurance that it is delivering its functions in a way that meets the needs of our patients and communities across Norfolk and Waveney as laid out in the Terms of Reference. 

The Committee will receive insight, make sure it is gathered appropriately, and monitor progress to ensure that change is happening. It will also constantly refer back to the ‘so what’ question – what this means for our people and communities. Meeting papers are made available a week in advance and meetings are held in public.

Each Board meeting held in public features a section on the agenda for discussion and learning using real examples of staff feedback and lived experience. The ‘Learning from our staff, people and communities’ films are available to view here as part of the ICB Board meetings pages.

Our duty to consult and involve is clearly laid out in our constitution and in our Governance Handbook. It is also a key part of our Annual Reporting.

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