Prevention and Cure: How the NHS can save £20 billion

04/11/2009

"It is possible to develop cheaper, more effective patient-centred services and approaches to public behaviour change but only by adopting radical new ways of innovating within the NHS."

The NHS can save over £20bn by 2014 if clinicians and patients are given the right to design healthcare services claims a new report by NESTA, the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts.

The report also argues that the UK needs to adopt a new approach to the big health challenges it faces such as obesity and alcohol consumption;  moving away from centrally driven directives to placing the challenge and responsibility in the hands of the public. This approach is already being pioneered through innovative programmes across the UK (see case studies below).

The report draws on NESTA's work in both these areas. It shows that reducing the biggest cost to the NHS - £69bn per year[1] for treating long-term conditions such as obesity, cardiovascular disease and diabetes - will require the adoption of new forms of healthcare, delivered by people with the best understanding of the conditions. Doing so would provide a saving of at least £6.9bn a year - 10% of its annual budget for treating long-term conditions - from 2011 until 2014[2].

In addition, involving communities in the prevention of long-term conditions is also shown to have a significant impact on changing behaviour. By reversing the traditional top down approach to healthcare service design, communities who ran behaviour change campaigns saw reduced levels of illnesses and an increase in healthy living at a fraction of the cost of government run campaigns.

Jonathan Kestenbaum, NESTA's Chief Executive says: 'The NHS does not have to choose between saving money and saving lives, or between cutting costs and reforming itself. It is possible to develop cheaper, more effective patient-centred services and approaches to public behaviour change but only by adopting radical new ways of innovating within the NHS.'

NESTA acknowledges that patient-centred services and preventative behaviour change are difficult to develop particularly in large organisations.  For the NHS to be successful, patients and clinicians will need to be put in control, using vehicles like social enterprise to make change happen.

NESTA's report is being published today, with Andrew Lansley MP, Shadow Secretary of State for Health and Tim Kelsey, founder and Chief Executive of Dr Foster Intelligence.

[1] The King's Fund (2009), Long-term Conditions.

[2] The NHS has announced that it will need to cut its spending by £15bn to £20bn in the 2011-2014 spending round

Contact

For further information, or to speak to the case studies, please contact Chani Hirsch in NESTA's Press Office on 020 7438 2601 or Chani.Hirsch@nesta.org.uk or Jan Singleton on 020 7438 2606 or Jan.Singleton@nesta.org.uk

Notes to editors

Case studies:

Birmingham OwnHealth

Birmingham OwnHealth, a personalised telephone support service for people with heart problems and diabetes demonstrates how new services can deliver better health outcomes. Care managers build ongoing relationships with patients, providing motivation, support and information to help encourage them to improve their health and get the best health outcomes from treatment programmes already recommended by their GP. The results are two-fold: it empowers people to take control of their own health and the increased levels of self-care positively contribute towards improving the health and wellness of individuals. Set up in 2007, Birmingham OwnHealth has a target to reduce GP visits by 32% and medical admissions by 48% by 2012.

Knowsley

Knowsley in Merseyside, the fifth most deprived borough in the UK with higher mortality rates of cardiovascular disease, respiratory disease and cancer than the rest of country. A major awareness programme called Knowsley at Heart was set up to bring down rates of heart disease and stroke - offering clinical check-ups in non-medical locations such as shopping centres, bingo halls and pubs. Championed by local people, the borough has seen an overall improvement in healthier living, a 28 per cent reduction of lung cancer morbidity and a 32 per cent increase in people quitting smoking.

Big Green Challenge

NESTA's Big Green Challenge is an example of an inexpensive approach to behaviour change. It threw down the gauntlet to communities to tackle climate change by offering a £1million prize fund as an incentive to devise new ways of reducing C02 emissions. It has cost a fraction of recent central government-run advertising campaigns to promote healthy eating and activity.