Report back on Health meetings this week

I attended three health meetings this week.

Lead members of the Cumbria Health Scrutiny committee met with the Clinical Commissioning Group in Carlisle on Wednesday and with the Morecombe Bay Universities Hospital Trust at Westmorland General Hospital yesterday (Thursday 14th September).

These are part of a series of regular meetings between Health Scrutiny councillors and the providers of NHS healthcare in Cumbria. These meetings are a valuable channel of communication.

To permit a frank exchange of views on both sides the meetings take place under what is sometimes known as "Chatham House Rules" - e.g. the health trusts can tell us what they really think about issues like how much money the NHS needs and how things are actually going - on the understanding that we won't go rushing to the press and use it to score political points. By the same token we can raise the health issues that we are most concerned about and the health trusts know that we are not just scoring points because there is no political mileage for us in doing so.

However this does not mean that the meetings are secret - I wouldn't be in a position to publish this post if they were - the fact that they take place is in the public domain and the list of issues discussed is published in due course.

I don't think I would be breaking any rules if I say that both this week's meetings were useful and constructive and there was a frank but positive exchange of views.

The other health meeting I attended this week was the Copeland Health and Wellbeing forum which brings together Cumbria County Council and Copeland Borough Council in their Public Health promotion roles with a large number of private sector and voluntary bodies.

There are far too many such initiatives going on to give full details of them all, but they include

* Well Whitehaven - an initiative centred on Mirehouse ward (though also including a large chunk of Harbour and with impact on neighbouring areas) to support local bottom-up community initiatives to develop more healthy lifestyles

* Stoptober - iff you smoke and are happy with the effect that this has on your body, that is your decision. But if you want to give up, there will be a promotion and support in October to help you to give up smoking in October.

* Alcohol Awareness - there are initiatives in place to encourage those who drink alcohol to do so safely and responsibly

* Falls prevention - an initiative to help people to look at reducing their risk of injury from falls. this will include a "slipper swap" at Whitehaven Library later this month - you can bring an old pair of slippers to Whitehaven Library and they will be replaced with a new pair which will reduce your risk of falling.

* Domestic Violence - review of the position the police statistics for domestic violence in Cumbria generally and in Copeland are absolutely horrifying. Given that most of those who do eventually go to the police say that they didn't do so until after there had been a large number of previous incidents (most often the problem is only reported when a pregnancy changes the situation,) the real incidence of domestic violence including unreported instances may be far worse.  There is no "magic bullet" to solve this but it needs to be addressed.