Integrated care systems are unlikely to demonstrate financial savings for at least three years, a Nuffield Trust study into Trafford’s pioneering work in the field has said.

NHS organisations in Trafford have worked for more than three years to develop a model of coordinated working across a network of primary, secondary and social care providers.

The aim is to provide improved and less costly services, particularly for patients with multiple chronic health needs, by reducing fragmentation between services and providing more care in community settings.

The Towards Integrated Care in Trafford report says: “The Trafford experience suggests that two years of initial development, followed by a minimum of one year of ‘live’ working, and almost certainly longer, is required to show the initial effects of major changes to service organisation and provision, particularly financial savings.”

According to the report, the impetus to pursue integration in the area came from a long history of financial problems, including the acute provider Trafford Healthcare Trust being unable to “retrieve its own financial position without causing severe financial difficulty for the Trafford system”.

The report argues that Trafford is “well placed to be a test case for emerging policy on integrated care” given the area’s focus on clinical leadership, patient involvement and “outcomes based” quality measures.

 

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