You can always rely on the NHS and its army of dedicated staff to be there when you need them, but in the past, these separate organisations haven’t worked together very well and that hasn’t helped our patients. Now there’s a real determination to work together in partnership so that we can offer the people of Leeds and West Yorkshire services that meet their needs, not our convenience.

We share, we learn from each other, and we make sure that we are providing the services people need in places they can easily get to. It’s complicated, and things don’t happen as quickly as we’d like, but there is a genuine will to make the NHS the best it can be and to spend the money that’s available as wisely as we can.

Leeds Partners

Our NHS partners in Leeds are:

• Leeds GP Confederation
• Leeds Health and Care Partnership
• Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust 
• Leeds and York Partnership NHS Foundation Trust

We are part of the West Yorkshire and Harrogate Health Care Partnership and are working at this larger scale to design and deliver region-wide services such as cancer care. You can find out more by viewing the news section of their website.

But the NHS only makes up part of the health and social care jigsaw. Services and support are offered by charity and voluntary groups, which the NHS refers to as ‘the third sector’. Sometimes these are ‘commissioned’ – which means there is a contract which sets out the quality and quantity of services to be provided and the amount paid for them; sometimes they are provided on a voluntary basis and no money changes hands.

LCH is proud of the partnerships we already have with third sector organisations but we recognise that there is much more that we can achieve to better meet people’s health and care needs and to reduce health inequalities through working together to develop pathways and services and on shared agendas and developing infrastructure, systems and processes that enable partnerships to thrive.

Read about LCH’s first Third Sector Strategy.

We are a founding partner of Leeds Academic Health Partnership, comprising all of the city’s NHS organisations, three universities and Leeds City Council, as well as regional and third sector members. Leeds Academic Health Partnership works to solve some of the city’s hardest health and care challenges, by uniting our city’s academic strengths with those of the health and care system and industry partners to accelerate the adoption of innovation.

For more information and to subscribe to the Partnership’s ebulletins, please visit www.leedsacademichealthpartnership.org

LCH works closely with Leeds Health and Care Academy. The organisation works with all health and care organisations across Leeds, including primary care, voluntary, community, and independent providers, as well as educational institutions to create better integration of the health and social care workforce in Leeds and realise the potential of our One Workforce.  The Academy designs and delivers learning and development opportunities and collaborative workforce projects for all health and care staff and organisations across the city.

Local Councils also have responsibility for public health and for providing social care  – this means care that isn’t considered to be nursing; and a wide range of other critical services. Public health includes things like health promotion campaigns and inspecting shops which make and sell food. Old people’s care homes and social services are the bulk of the social care work.

Find out more about Leeds City Council health and social care.