Healthcare in the Community Group (HCG)

One of the joys of general practice is seeing the same patients over time and getting to know them and their families. I worked in the same small practice for over twenty years and saw people go from active sixty-somethings, slowing down in their seventies, and then becoming frail in their eighties.

Across the UK, our National Health Service is facing huge challenges. There are unprecedented delays for ambulances and waits in emergency departments.

With the national agenda to create virtual wards has come an increasing demand to develop Hospital at Home (hospital@home, H@H) services. Guys and St Thomas’ H@H, operational since 2014, “takes the ward to the patient’s home”.

I have reached that point in my PhD when everyone is asking me me “when is your PhD ending?”. I’m about halfway through and I’m enjoying it. I’m not wishing it away just yet!

In this guest blog Candace Imison, from the NIHR Centre for Engagement and Dissemination, speaks about a recently published Collection that brings together NIHR-funded research in care homes and asks how this research could be used to improve the quality of care.

There’s a wave of excitement sweeping through my Zooms. More and more of us in the NHS are hungry for advice about how to reduce our carbon footprint, but many of us just don’t know where to start.