NEW NHS commissioners have tasked local people to help to plan and develop healthcare services for their own communities.

Durham Dales, Easington and Sedgefield (DDES) Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) is working with patients and local community groups across its three localities, giving them the opportunity to discuss the health services they want to see commissioned.

“As GPs we have been tasked with running the NHS and our patients’ views will be central to everything we do,” said DDES CCG Accountable Officer, Dr Stewart Findlay.

“We need to know what health services local communities want, find the needs that are not currently being met, and work with people to deliver the best healthcare possible – closer to patients’ homes.

“Although we have set out many of our commissioning intentions for the first five years, this will be refreshed, year-on-year, with patient and community views forming a central part of our planning.

“There are a number of ways that patients can feed back their views.

“They can speak directly to their own GP or through patient and locality groups which feed directly into the CCG governing body. This body also includes a number of patient representatives.”

DDES Interim Director of Performance and Information, Joseph Chandy, said: “We need to tell people what we are doing and how the changes in the new NHS will impact locally.

“We also want our patients to help us to develop our commissioning intentions – basically give us a shopping list of which health services they feel they need within their own communities.

“By understanding the users of the service we will see how best to prioritise our budget to meet peoples’ needs in the most clinically effective way possible.”