Sajid Javid will today outline his “new vision for NHS reform” which places more responsibility on the patient for their own care.
The Health Secretary will push forward plans to allow patients on the record NHS waiting list to shop around for NHS care.
Most of the six million NHS patients caught in England’s treatment backlog can already go online to compare hospital waiting lists, before requesting via their GP to be treated elsewhere in the country.
In a speech Mr Javid is expected to imply that increasing NHS funding in line with historic average rises is “unsustainable” and that “reform” is needed, including an increased role for the NHS app.
Mr Javid is set to say: “Those are the long-term challenges the NHS must adapt to: changing demographics and disease; changing technology and expectations; and unsustainable finances.
“Taken together, it’s clear we were always going to come to a crossroads: a point where we must choose between endlessly putting in more and more money, or reforming how we do healthcare.
“There were major challenges before the pandemic.
“Pressures in social care were rising substantially too.
“But without the pandemic, the Covid backlogs, an even more stretched workforce and other new pressures, that choice might have been many years down the line.
“The shock of Covid and the urgent need for recovery has brought us to this crossroads right now.
“I choose reform.”
NHS funding has historically increased by around 4% on average since its foundation in 1948 to keep pace with a growing population and new technologies.
This dropped as low as 1% during the Tories’ austerity period in the last decade but recent Government funding settlements have it back to almost 4%.
However record waiting lists and staff shortages left it vulnerable as it entered the Covid-19 pandemic that has battered health systems around the world.
Mr Javid has warned the six million waiting list in England could rise as high as 10 million as patients who avoided the NHS gradually come forward with conditions that have deteriorated.
Under his plans, by the end of this year all patients who have been waiting for 18 months or more will be contacted to discuss the choices they have about changing their NHS provider.
Over four million people are set to benefit from the expansion of “personalised care”, which could give them control of a personalised budget to spend on their care.
The NHS also aims to get 75% of all adults in England using the app by March 2024, making it easier for people to book appointments, communicate with different care providers and see test results.
Mr Javid also aims to roll out electronic records to 90% of trusts by December 2023 and 80% of social care providers by March 2024.
Speaking at The Dorchester Library of the Royal College of Physicians in London, Mr Javid will say patients should be offered more choice and know average waiting times at the point of referral.
NHS England has worked with the plans to support the significant proportion of the population caught up in the treatment backlog in the coming years.
The My Planned Care platform is already live on www.nhs.uk and NHS provider information on there is set to be expanded.
NHS England chief executive Amanda Pritchard said: “As the NHS recovers services and addresses the Covid-19 backlogs that have inevitably built up during the pandemic, these measures will support the work of the NHS Long Term Plan – giving more patients greater choice and control over their own health.
“The pandemic has shown us what can be achieved when we work together across health, social and wider community services and taken with the reforms set out in the Health and Care Bill, these actions will help to ensure patients and their families are firmly in the driving seat when it comes to making decisions about their care.”
It comes amid unprecedented pressure on GP surgeries which have traditionally been the gatekeepers to NHS care.
Nigel Edwards, chief executive at health thinktank the Nuffield Trust, said: “Using choice of hospital and personalised budgets is a perfectly good policy and will help some patients get care that suits them better.
“But the big problems with offering people care tailored to their needs lie elsewhere.
“Above all, we need general practice to survive the immense pressure it faces and to be able to offer all the different types of patient who need it the right kind of care.
“Be that a rapid telephone appointment, or a face-to-face chat with a GP they know.
“This is the bedrock of the NHS and the part we rely on to coordinate care around patients, but I am worried that it is in danger of failing.
“The Secretary of State will need to carefully incentivise general practice to work in bigger units and develop more administrative ability, making use of digital technology for patients able to use it and offering alternatives for those that can’t.
“This must be done without simply imposing a model from Whitehall that doesn’t work for everyone.”
