Here is a meeting briefing on the Kent Health and Wellbeing Board meeting of 25 September 2025.

The Kent Health and Wellbeing Board convened to discuss key public health initiatives, including approving the 2025-2028 Pharmaceutical Needs Assessment, receiving an update on the Public Health Service Transformation Programme, and considering the NHS's 10-year plan. The board approved the Pharmaceutical Needs Assessment and took note of the updates on the Transformation Programme and the NHS plan. Discussions covered topics from suicide prevention to immunisation, and the integration of health and social care services.

Pharmaceutical Needs Assessment 2025-2028 Approved

The Health and Wellbeing Board approved the final Pharmaceutical Needs Assessment (PNA) 2025-2028 and noted that the previously approved PNA process had occurred. The PNA assesses the current and future needs for pharmaceutical services in Kent over the next three years, considering the health needs of the population and how these needs can be met by pharmacies, appliance contractors and dispensing GPs.

The report concluded that there are no gaps in the provision of pharmaceutical services across Kent. However, this conclusion was challenged by Councillor Mike Blakemore, who noted that over 20 community pharmacies have closed, and that residents in his ward in Cheriton in Folkestone are experiencing long queues at the remaining pharmacy. He questioned how the council can be confident that pharmacies will be able to continue to meet the growing need for pharmaceutical services, especially with an ageing population.

In response, an officer stated that the PNA took into account the need to maintain the financial stability of the existing pharmacy network, and that based on the evidence at the time of writing, the current pharmacy network is sufficient to meet the needs of the population. She added that the PNA is a snapshot in time, and that the council will continue to monitor the landscape and publish supplementary statements where needed.

Another councillor asked what defined thresholds would trigger a review of the PNA. An officer clarified that changes to the pharmaceutical list, such as changes in opening hours or closures, are continuously monitored, and that any significant changes where there is a significant need in question, the Health and Wellbeing Board can decide to revise the whole PNA itself.

Mrs Chris Palmer, a board member, shared her experience of a GP surgery in her ward that stopped dispensing prescriptions unless patients were disabled or very elderly and frail, and the impact this had on residents who now had to travel further to get their prescriptions. She described the new system as:

longer, further and sometimes you put the prescription in and you have to wait like 10 days to get an acknowledgement that it's been received because it's all done by email.

An officer responded that in more rural areas, dispensing GPs are available, and that there are strict criteria for which they are allowed to provide medicines to residents, such as living more than 1.6 kilometres away from a pharmacy.

A representative from the NHS added that the NHS manages appliance contractors, community pharmacies and dispensing doctors against their contracts, and that if there was ever a concern that the service did not meet the standards of the contract, there are processes by which feedback can be collected and acted upon.

Vicky Tovey, Assistant Director of Integrated Commissioning, noted that Health Watch also collates patient feedback and distills that into themes and trends.

Public Health Service Transformation Program Update

Vicky Tovey, Assistant Director of Integrated Commissioning, provided an update on the Public Health Service Transformation Programme, which commenced in the summer of 2023 and aims to improve services funded by the Public Health Grant. The programme's key aims include targeting resources to those that most need it, particularly trying to tackle health inequalities and prevention obligations, and ensuring best value.

The programme includes a wide scope of services, from health visiting and infant feeding to older people's exercise, and includes mandated and statutory services. The programme is now in the final implementation phase, which includes procurement, transitioning to new models, and communicating changes to residents and the wider system.

Mr Mark Mulvihill, a board member, asked how referrals would be taken for the children's and young people's emotional well being service, which SALAS is taking over in November, and how the service would improve the transition of care from children to adults. Vicky Tovey responded that referrals will be taken in a number of ways, including self-referrals, referrals from schools, and referrals from wider partners across the system, and that communications have gone out to let people know that. She added that the service will see up to 19 year olds, and that it will be complemented by some of the ICB services who will go up to a slightly older age range, and that the services will work very closely together to work out where young people best fit.

Councillor Perkins asked what is being done to specifically look after children who are on the pathway to being diagnosed with neurodiversity and then on the pathway to, in the kind of waiting process for EHCP reviews¹, how the place-based infant feeding fits in with the Family Hub programme² across Kent, and how there can be place-based prioritisation in smoking cessation services in Swale, which has very high levels of smoking.

Vicky Tovey responded that the school health service offers advice to schools, and that the services commissioned around counselling and well-being have a high uptake in neurodiverse young people. She added that the service has tried to increase other methods that young people can get in touch, such as web chat, and that the service does also do some specific packages of care for parents and others to support around those kind of areas which might be behaviour related or kind of well-being.

She added that KCC is supporting the family hub initiative, and that many of the services, such as health visiting and infant feeding, are being delivered from those family hubs, and that the providers need to deliver where they can from those family hubs or at least be aligned or linked to them from a virtual perspective.

She noted that public health has received an additional grant dedicated to smoking, and that they have commissioned some additional bespoke services, one of which is a more outreach based service that goes out into those areas, those hot spots which would of course include Swale to really try and encourage people to come in.

Mrs Palmer added that there are 52 family hubs in Kent, and that they have secured funding through the Family First initiative for early intervention.

Councillor Blakemore asked for more information about adult lifestyle services, and how the council will tackle obesity. Vicky Tovey responded that the procurement is live, and that they are evaluating this week, and that they have asked the new provider to offer a greater choice to try and encourage some of those groups into the service, recognising that some other people might actually be quite happy to download some of the apps that are available.

The Health and Wellbeing Board noted the information contained within the update report.

Update from the Integrated Care Board on the NHS 10 Year Plan

Edward Waller, Chief Strategy Officer and Chief Commissioner at the ICB, gave an overview of the NHS 10 Year Plan and how it will be taken forward in Kent and Medway. He explained that the plan has three main shifts: from hospitals to community, from treatment to prevention, and from analogue to digital. He noted that the plan describes a number of changes to the health system, including the merger of NHS England and the Department of Health, and changes to ICB footprints to become larger and cover bigger populations.

He focused on the centrality in the 10-year plan of what's described as neighbourhood health, which means bringing together health services provided by different parts of the NHS, GPs, community health teams, bits of the acute hospital sector, delivering services in the community, community mental health services, and some of the services that councils provide, such as adult social care and housing. He noted that Folkestone and Hive was chosen as a national accelerator and pilot programme because it has a very significant concentration of the sorts of citizens that would benefit from a different model of NHS care.

Councillor Perkins asked how cottage hospitals fit into the 10-year plan, and whether there is an urgency to getting them reopened, as the cottage hospital in her town, Faversham, has been closed for eight weeks and looks like it's not going to be reopened for some time. She also raised concerns about staff burnout, the stop of international recruitment into the NHS, and the lack of discussion around social care and its interaction with the NHS.

Edward Waller responded that the hospital is part of the service commissioned from Kent Community Health, and they took the decision to close it on the basis of patient safety and their ability to staff the facility. He added that there is an important question about neighbourhood health and the extent to which beds in facilities like the Faversham Hospital are part of the future model, and that the aim of what they're doing on neighbourhood health is to try and get to the point where they describe the best model for the future.

He noted that there is a general consensus that we would like to be able to rely on the domestic supply of healthcare staff, and that lots of good healthcare professional training goes on inside Kent and Medway. He added that in an ideal world, we would be training as many healthcare staff as possible in Kent, to work in Kent.

He acknowledged that social care was not really given the weight that is needed to be able to truly embed those community services within the areas that our residents need them, and that the system has to get right is that some people need to be in hospital for a particular reason, but one there is always a point where being in hospital is less good for you than being somewhere else.

Dr Bob Bowes, a board member, noted that the aims are not new, and that the actual delivery of those things often runs up against other things, such as the enormous pressure on the acute trusts to manage within their budgets. He added that the trick with this is to break down the organisational barriers and begin to make areas responsible for the change collectively.

Mrs Palmer added that 35 years ago plus we had lots of care homes throughout Kent that had step-down beds or rehab beds where people were discharged and they used to go there to get physio, get therapy, get back on their feet, gain their strength and mobility back, and that unfortunately, 99% of those are now gone. She noted that one of the biggest barriers to a successful service is communication, and that she is a huge believer that health and social care should be brought together as one.

Edward Waller responded that the system has to get right is that some people need to be in hospital for a particular reason, but one there is always a point where being in hospital is less good for you than being somewhere else, and that therefore sometimes the best reason for someone to leave a hospital is not that the money or the bed might be used for somebody else it's that it's not good for them.

The Health and Wellbeing Board noted the update from the Integrated Care Board on the NHS 10 Year Plan.