Prynhawn Da/Good afternoon and thank you to Headway for inviting me, as Chair of the Assembly’s Cross Party Group on Neurological Conditions, to sponsor their first National Assembly for Wales event.
It is a privilege to Chair Cross Groups in the National Assembly for Wales including the Cross Party Group for Neurological Conditions and the Cross Party Group on Disability - and it has been a privilege to Chair the Cross Party Group for Neurosciences/Neurological Conditions across three Assembly terms since its initial inception in April 2009, ably supported throughout by the Wales Neurological Alliance, of which Headway is a key member, in our shared determination to improve services for, and work with, people affected by neurological conditions.
Neurological conditions are caused by disease or injury to the body’s nervous system.
Headway is the UK-wide charity that works to improve life after brain injury.
Through its network of more than 125 groups and branches across the UK, it provides support, services and information to brain injury survivors, their families and carers, as well as to professionals in the health and legal fields.
At Headway, people use insight and care to help survivors regain some quality of life through a wide range of services, including rehabilitation programmes, carer support, social re-integration, community outreach and respite care.
Headway provides a range of frontline services to help those affected by brain injury, including:
- a freephone helpline
- a comprehensive award-winning website containing information and factsheets on all aspects of brain injury
- an award-winning range of booklets and publications designed to help people understand and cope with the effects of brain injury;
- an emergency fund to assist people dealing with the financial implications in the immediate aftermath of a brain injury;
- Headway Acute Trauma Support (HATS) nurses to support families whose loved ones are in the acute stage of care following brain injury;
- a network of more than 125 groups and branches that provide physical, cognitive and social rehabilitation and support to individuals and families;
- a directory of approved residential homes, rehabilitation units and respite facilities specialising in Acquired Brain Injury.
The charity also lobbies for better support and resources to be made available to people affected by brain injury and works to raise awareness of brain injury and the devastating effects it can have.
In Wales, Headway has one Group based here in Cardiff covering the Vale of Glamorgan, Newport and Rhondda Cynon Taf.
Elsewhere it has 11 branches covering Bridgend, Carmarthenshire, Ceredigion, Merthyr Tydfil, Neath Port Talbot, Pembrokeshire, South Powys, Swansea - and in north Wales branches covering Gwynedd & Ynys Mon, Conwy & Denbighshire and Wrexham & Flintshire.
Between them, these branches cover 14 counties, run by hard working dedicated volunteers.
Dave and Rebecca will tell you more about what services they provide shortly.
The charity holds an annual Action for Brian Injury Week in May each year and this year’s theme is ‘A New Me’, which provided the inspiration for today’s gathering.
We will be hearing first hand from brain injury survivors Lisa, Nicola, Gareth and Zalehka, from others via video who will tell us about their lives before and after brain injury, and how Headway has helped them on their journey to find their ‘New Me’.
After we have heard these testimonies, we will break for lunch and the round table discussions on what support people feel would have been most useful to them in building a ‘new me’.
Before that, though, we thought it would be good to set the strategic scene with a whistle stop tour of the Welsh Government’s Neurological Conditions Delivery Plan update.
In March, the Welsh Government’s Neurological Conditions Implementation Group published an update of the Neurological Conditions Delivery Plan.
It reaffirms the Welsh Government’s commitment to both raising awareness of neurological conditions and ensuring those affected by any kind of neurological condition have timely access to high quality pathways of care, irrespective of where they live and whether these are delivered through hospitals or in the community.
The document states that progress has been made in improving the care of people with a neurological condition in Wales.
There is still more to do though.
The amount of time an individual spends in hospital has fallen from 6.4 days in 2010-11 to 4.2 days in 2015-16.
In 2015-16, 511 patients were recruited into a neurological health and care research Wales clinical research portfolio study.
This was an increase of 385 patients (300%) compared to 2010-11- a tribute to all those involved in the planning and delivery of services for people with neurological conditions.
The Implementation Group expects to see health boards delivering at greater pace to improve outcomes for people with neurological conditions, reducing clinical variation and working across organisational boundaries. It expects health board neurological condition plans to be fully integrated within health board strategic planning, for national standards and pathways to be fully delivered.
The document recognises that health and social care has an enormous challenge ahead as our population is growing and ageing.
In the context of our socio-economic situation, it is estimated that there are around 100,000 people with a neurological condition in Wales.
In addition, Public Health Wales figures for 2014-15 indicate that 10,000 people each year were admitted to hospital with an acquired brain injury.
The latest available figures highlighted that between 2010-11 and 2014-15 there was a 65% increase in NHS expenditure on neurological conditions, making it the tenth biggest spend for the NHS in terms of per head of population.
This demand will be set against the finite resources likely to be available for health and care services in Wales, which makes it challenging to simultaneously improve quality and performance.
The Implementation Group’s vision is for fully integrated primary, community, secondary and specialist pathways of care, designed around the needs of the patient, to provide the support needed for patients to do what they can to manage their condition.
This plan builds on the foundations from the previous plan and continues to drive forward the vision for improving neurological services across Wales more effectively and at a greater pace, in conjunction with Health Boards’ local vision for their resident population and aligned with Integrated Medium Term Plans.
Collaborative working between the Implementation Group, NHS organisations, social services and third sector partners is key to ensure that services effectively meet population need and reduce variability of services.
This updated Delivery Plan is out for comment at the moment, and to facilitate input from people living with a neurological condition in Wales, the Wales Neurological Alliance, including Headway, held 4 consultation events in north, mid, west and south Wales in late April and early May.
Views expressed at these events are being collated by the WNA and will be channelled back to the Implementation Group within the next few weeks or so.
Let us embrace the approach being championed by the co-production for Wales, which unlocks community strengths and enables people and professionals to work together in equal relationships to make public services more effective and relevant - with local authorities, health boards and the third sector working much more imaginatively to develop better services that are closer to people, more responsive to needs, add value by drawing on community resources and deliver savings for the Health and Social Care economy.
I would now like to invite Dave and Rebecca to give us an overview of the support Headway provides across Wales.