Working with Health Innovation Northwest February 2026
There was no meeting of the Patient and Public Involvement Senate in January and the December one was bringing together a summary of the year’s work.
In February, the first presentation was about the structured medication reviews that are currently taking place across Cheshire and Merseyside. Prior to the commencement of the project the group had reviewed the Patient Information resources and suggested quite a few changes which had all been adopted and have now been nationally agreed and rolled out. Training is still ongoing in the area for GPs, pharmacists and nurse clinicians on carrying out the reviews and some reviews are already underway.
The group then reviewed the patient questionnaire for the ENROL project which is a project on rehabilitation of stroke patients online and the survey has been created to determine patients’ views on whether they find the online course via an App preferable to attending sessions at a hospital and how comfortable they feel using the App.
At the November meeting we were given details of the new Community Acute Respiratory Infection (CARI) project. This was started initially in 2021 and involved patients being tested for flu or COVID in the community and treated accordingly. The aim of the project is to reduce hospital admissions for people with acute respiratory infections.
The season 2025/2026 will include point of care testing for more viral infections (flu, COVID, RSV and bacterial infections). It means that antibiotics and antivirals can be used more appropriately. There was an update this month explaining that there are some sites up and running in our area for the project and that it is also being adopted in other parts of the country..
Julia Bate
February 2026
Working with Health Innovation Northwest June 2026
There was no meeting of the Patient and Public Involvement Senate in March or May.
At the April meeting which I was unable to attend, there was a presentation on the new NROL platform (https://elht.nhs.uk/services/integrated-therapy-service/neuro-rehabilitation-online) which is an online platform for rehabilitation of patients who have had a stroke.
This was also discussed at the June meeting as it has proved successful for patients and means that they do not have to travel to a hospital for sessions. It also provides the opportunity for them to discuss their problems with people in a similar situation. The service is scheduled to be rolled out to other areas in Lancashire and South Cumbria, and hopefully also into Cheshire and Merseyside. It is also hoped that it can be extended to cover other conditions such as heart failure and COPD.
Also at the June meeting there was a presentation about work being carried out to reduce fuel poverty in Cheshire and Merseyside along with West Lancashire. High risk patients such as those with severe COPD or pre-school wheeze have been identified and systems put in place to assist with fuel bills and provide energy-saving advice. Interventions have shown an approximately 10% reduction in GP appointments. The work is carried out in conjunction with Energy Projects Plus. (https://www.epplus.org.uk/)
Julia Bate
June 2026