Type of Trust
NHS Primary Care Trust NHS Primary Care Trust An NHS primary care trust is a type of NHS trust, part of the National Health Service in England. PCTs commission primary, community and secondary care from providers. Until 31 may2011 they also provided community services directly. Collectively PCT are responsible for spending around 80% of the...
NHS Region
North West North West England North West England, informally known as The North West, is one of the nine official regions of England.North West England had a 2006 estimated population of 6,853,201 the third most populated region after London and the South East...
Location
Blackburn, Lancashire, BB1 2QH
Trust Details
Last annual budget	£16million (2006–2007)
Employees	916 (as of 2006)
Chair	Nick Kennedy
Chief Executive	Neil Matthewman
Links
Website	Trust official website
Wiki-Links	National Health Service National Health Service The National Health Service is the shared name of three of the four publicly funded healthcare systems in the United Kingdom. They provide a comprehensive range of health services, the vast majority of which are free at the point of use to residents of the United Kingdom...

Blackburn with Darwen tPCT is a UK National Health Service

National Health Service

The National Health Service is the shared name of three of the four publicly funded healthcare systems in the United Kingdom. They provide a comprehensive range of health services, the vast majority of which are free at the point of use to residents of the United Kingdom...

 Primary Care Trust

NHS Primary Care Trust

An NHS primary care trust is a type of NHS trust, part of the National Health Service in England. PCTs commission primary, community and secondary care from providers. Until 31 may2011 they also provided community services directly. Collectively PCT are responsible for spending around 80% of the...

, responsible for commissioning & purchasing of health care in Blackburn with Darwen

Darwen

Darwen is a market town and civil parish located within Lancashire, England. Along with its northerly neighbour, Blackburn, it forms the Borough of Blackburn with Darwen — a unitary authority area...

 in Lancashire

Lancashire

Lancashire is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in the North West of England. It takes its name from the city of Lancaster, and is sometimes known as the County of Lancaster. Although Lancaster is still considered to be the county town, Lancashire County Council is based in Preston...

. It comes under the North West of England's

North West England

North West England, informally known as The North West, is one of the nine official regions of England.North West England had a 2006 estimated population of 6,853,201 the third most populated region after London and the South East...

 NHS Strategic Health Authority

NHS Strategic Health Authority

NHS strategic health authorities are part of the structure of the National Health Service in England. Each SHA is responsible for enacting the directives and implementing fiscal policy as dictated by the Department of Health at a regional level. In turn each SHA area contains various NHS trusts...

 (SHA).

History

Blackburn with Darwen PCT was formed in 2000 by Order of the Secretary of State for Health

Secretary of State for Health

Secretary of State for Health is a UK cabinet position responsible for the Department of Health.The first Boards of Health were created by Orders in Council dated 21 June, 14 November, and 21 November 1831. In 1848 a General Board of Health was created with the First Commissioner of Woods and...

  Alan Milburn

Alan Milburn

Alan Milburn is a British Labour Party politician, who was the Member of Parliament for Darlington from 1992 until 2010...

 by means of the National Health Service Act of Parliament

Act of Parliament

An Act of Parliament is a statute enacted as primary legislation by a national or sub-national parliament. In the Republic of Ireland the term Act of the Oireachtas is used, and in the United States the term Act of Congress is used.In Commonwealth countries, the term is used both in a narrow...

 1977, and is co-terminus with Blackburn with Darwen Borough

Blackburn with Darwen

Blackburn with Darwen is a unitary authority area in Lancashire, North West England. It consists of Blackburn, the small town of Darwen to the south of it, and the surrounding countryside.-Formation:...

 Council. It became a teaching PCT in 2007, having survived a series of mergers intact.

Between 1982 and 1994 the local healthcare fundholders for this area was known as the Blackburn, Hyndburn and Ribble Valley District Health Authority, which came under the Lancashire Area Health Authority (which has now been replaced by the North West Region SHA). It was then reorganised into part of the East Lancashire ' District ' Health Authority.
. Under this administration, the function of fundholders was known as the Blackburn with Darwen primary care group sub committee, before being replaced yet again by the creation of the present trust in 2000.

Responsibilities

The Trust serves a population of approximately 163,000 people and in common with other PCTs has three core responsibilities, these are:

• Engaging with its local population to improve health and well-being.
• To collaborate with G.P's to commission a comprehensive equitable range of high quality, responsive and efficient where this gives the best value.
• To directly provide high quality, responsive and efficient services where this gives the best value.

Geographical spread

The Trust is responsible for the commissioning of healthcare on all of the following sites:
Source: Department of Health. NHS Choices: Blackburn With Darwen PCT

Public Health Strategy

The Blackburn with Darwen area suffers from severe health inequalities., in particular there have been reports of an increase in cases of rickets

Rickets

Rickets is a softening of bones in children due to deficiency or impaired metabolism of vitamin D, magnesium , phosphorus or calcium, potentially leading to fractures and deformity. Rickets is among the most frequent childhood diseases in many developing countries...

in the area.
In response to this the Living Better, Living Longer strategy was launched in 2007.
The purpose of the strategy is to:

• Encourage the Trust, its partners and the population of Blackburn with Darwen to do what it can to live better and longer lives
• To identify what needs to happen with an implementation plan that will make a positive impact on the health and well-being of the Blackburn with Darwen population.

This is accomplished by a process called commissioning. This is defined as: The strategic activity of assessing needs, resources and current services, and developing a strategy to make best use of available resources to meet identified needs.

Once this has been completed, the actual purchasing of health services needed to meet the needs and priorities identified can go a head. The definition used for purchasing is: The operational activity set within the context of commissioning, of applying resources to buy services in order to meet needs, either at a macro/population level or at a micro/individual level.

The Jarman Centre

The Jarman Centre, a facility of the Teaching PCT, located on James Street Blackburn was one of the first Health Promotion Units in England to respond to the public health challenges of HIV / AIDS. Under the direction of Peter Cash, the Jarman Centre was at the forefront of innovative approaches to combat the spread of HIV infections. It promoted primary and secondary prevention initiatives in the field of sexual health and substance misuse; both recognised as key transmission routes for HIV and other blood borne viruses such as hepatitis B and hepatitis C. Through primary prevention initiatives the Jarman Centre established comprehensive training programmes aimed at improving the awareness and education of public and voluntary sector workers around substance misuse and sexual health issues which affect individuals and communities. It also established effective education and prevention programmes with service users, including the development of comprehensive harm reduction services and client education interventions. These continue to this day,and are continually reviewed and assessed to ensure that current projects are relevant to the health needs of the community.

Examples of current work include: outreach initiatives to provide hepatitis B vaccination to the homeless, engagement with injectors of performance enhancing drugs to raise awareness of the many potentially serious health and social consequences of misuse and the development of an interactive distance learning resource to raise awareness of primary and secondary prevention issues in relation to hepatitis C.

Another important aspect of Jarman Centre work is inter-agency collaboration with other key services across Blackburn with Darwen and East Lancashire. In this regard the Jarman Centre has over recent years organised and delivered a range of seminars and conferences covering issues such as effective responses to cannabis use, vascular care of injecting drug users, HIV prevention in the community whilst also developing inter agency harm reduction strategies to tackle substance misuse across Blackburn with Darwen and east Lancashire. The Jarman Centre has recently been commissioned to provide a comprehensive harm reduction service for injecting drug users based at Burnley House, Westgate, Burnley. This mirrors the harm reduction service operating from the Jarman Centre in Blackburn. All the pharmacy based needle exchange programmes across Blackburn with Darwen and East Lancashire are co-ordinated by the Jarman Centre.

Monitoring and Assessment of Services

The PCT is also responsible for monitoring and assessment of these services whilst they are being provided to ensure that the service providers are adhering to the plan laid out, to the agreed standards of care and are providing value for money.

External links

• Blackburn with Darwen tPCT website. Accessed 2007-01-17
• Blackburn with Darwen Health and Wellbeing website. Accessed 2007-01-17
• The Patient and Public Involvement (PPI) Forum: Blackburn with Darwen. Accessed 2007-01-17

• Department of Health Performance Tables (2006). Blackburn With Darwen PCT - Ordinary and Day Case Admissions Combined. Accessed 2007-01-18