"Practice made Perfect at Health 1000"

The Health 1000 trial will end soon. My time there has been a privilege. I have seen how possible it is to access exemplary expertise delivered by a dedicated team. This practice has transformed the health care experience of their clients who all have complex and compound conditions. These frequent users of the N.H.S. make high demands on general practices.. As the population ages and medical advances are made the demand on care has come to exceed what is possible. Health 1000 is a model that aims to eleviate this by reducing avoidable calls on overused emergency units and hospital clinics. Quick response and early intervention can prevent chronic needs becoming acute and can sidestep hospital trips. This frees up far too thinly spread hospital time, space and personnel. If patients are to receive effective, frequent monitoring and intervention, they must feel it entirely possible to access the right treatment at the right time. As a consequence of an often perfunctorily reception in general practice many needy clients have learnt to avoid rather than seek help. As a result untreated issues worsen and end up needing acute attention. Experiences are easily bruised by less than welcoming interactions. To avoid this sad situation Health 1000 makes it entirely possible to undertake frequent, thorough and effective consultations. Home visits are the norm. Doctors, nurses, therapists and outreach organisations all offer at home support. Telephone consultations are readily undertaken and of course extended appointment spaces make visits effective and rewarding. There is detailed interdepartment communication. Conversations with outside agencies are welcomed. Cross facility integration has aided my own wellbeing by overcoming my sense of being a collection of different issues in different tightly guarded boxes rather than a whole person. By making contact with the practice a valuable, empowering event Health 1000 has transformed my care. Longstanding issues are resolved. Surgery practitioners show an awareness of my needs, preferences and wishes. This underpinning of "careful care" willingly undertaken engenders satisfaction for patients, practitioners and support staff alike. Does Health 1000 deliver its stated aims?Is it cost effectiive? I give the service 10 out of 10 for this. The provision has made me better!

It encourages professional development for team members, I have heard from outside clinicians that communication and response from Health 1000 is exemplary and I have witnessed for myself the difference a happy environment can make. Health 1000 is an expensive resource. Monies saved through fewer hospital interventions and proactive watching of unresolved conditions must be weighed against this. I dread the loss of Health 1000 and my unhappy return to a lesser provision. If permanent practices like this were established I feel sure that much of the unwarranted grumbling about the N.H.S. would soon disappear.