18^th March 2022

North Yorkshire Joint Strategic Needs Assessment and Joint Health and Wellbeing Strategy

Report of the Director of Public Health

1.0	Purpose of the Report
1.1	To inform Members of the process for updating the overarching aspect of the Joint Strategic Needs Assessment (JSNA) and producing a new Joint Health and Wellbeing Strategy (JHWBS).

2       Background information     

2.1 The Health and Wellbeing Board has a statutory responsibility to produce a Pharmaceutical Needs Assessment (PNA); JSNA; and JHWBS.

2.2       The purpose of a PNA is to set out current services and future commissioning intentions for pharmaceutical services.  The new PNA, for 2022-2024, comes into operation from 1^st October 2022 and a progress update is included elsewhere on the Agenda.

2.3       The JSNA is the process by which the County Council and Clinical Commissioning Groups assess the current and future health, care and wellbeing needs of the local community to inform local decision-making.  It is a rolling programme and characterises the health of the local population.

2.4       The JHWBS explains the health and wellbeing priorities that the Board has set in order to tackle the needs identified in the JSNA. 

2.5       The overarching aspect of the JSNA needs to be updated and a new JHWBS is required, as the current one has expired.  Priority has been given to dealing with the Covid Pandemic, which has taken up the majority of officers time over the last two years.

3.0 The Joint Strategic Needs Assessment (Overarching element)

3.1       This needs to be seen in the context of Place.  Place-based approaches are collaborative, long-term approaches to build thriving communities in a defined geographic location. 

3.2       As stated, the JSNA is a rolling programme and officers aim to update it regularly.  Whilst the expectation is that it be “up-to-date”, data at this scale is relatively slow to change, as some is reported on an annual basis only (but with a time lag, so it may be a couple of years old.)  Therefore, on occasions, the latest data relates to past years.  

3.3       A good deal of information about the health of the population in North Yorkshire is known, via Distirct Profiles and Clinical Commissioning Group Profiles.  In addition, work is being undertaken on updating the existing Profiles for Primary Care Networks.  A number of these area profiles can be found on the Data North Yorkshire site

3.4       As stated, the overarching element of the JSNA -  the Countywide Health Profile – needs to be updated.  This provides a very broad overview of the population health status in the County and some indication of inequalities between different groups.  Much of this data can be gathered from the PNA.  Therefore, data from the new PNA will be used to populate what is required for the JSNA.

4.0       The Joint Health and Wellbeing Strategy

4.1       The JHWBS needs to bring together population health data, with other system quantitative and qualitative information to set out population and service priorities.  It must also capture the North Yorkshire Place Board priorities – both informing and reflecting them.

4.2       Whilst the JHWBS has expired, the work of the County Council and its partners in striving to improve outcomes for people’s health and wellbeing has not stopped.  For example, initiatives related to Drug and Substance Misuse; Special Educational Needs and Disability; and Learning Disabilities continue, with the aim of advancing the health and wellbeing of people in North Yorkshire.

4.3       The JHWBS will form part of the Care Quality Commission’s assessment of Councils and, possibly, our two Integrated Care Systems (ICSs).  It needs to be published by March 2023, ahead of new assessment regimes.

4.4       A number of Specialist Workshops will be held that bring together the data and link to the population health work being undertaken by the County Council and its partners.   This will be used to synergise with the three North Yorkshire Place overarching priorities of Workforce; Integrated Community Care and Population Health/Prevention.  Following this initial work, a Health and Wellbeing Board Workshop will be held and a JHWBS will be produced. The Director of Public Health and the new Head of Health and Adult Services Planning, will lead this work, working with other Health and Wellbeing Board colleagues, especially within the NHS.

4.5       The ICSs will lead on the development of an Integrated Care Strategy and we need to ensure that North Yorkshire’s JHWBS is available to them, so that they can take this into acocunt in determining their Strategic Plans. 

5.0       Conclusion

5.1       The JSNA and the JHWBS are two of the three key documents that the Health and Wellbeing Board has a statutory duty to produce and they are closely linked by the third – the PNA which will, by proxy, provide much of the required data.

6.0 6.1

Recommendation That the process for updating the overarching element of the JSNA and for producing the JHWBS, as set out in paragraphs 3.4 and 4.4, respectively, be noted.

Louise Wallace

Director of Public Health                             

County Hall, Northallerton

March 2022

Background documents relied upon in the preparation of this report:  None