LGA calls for common boundaries in primary healthcare and social care

The Local Government Association has called on the government to
ensure common boundaries between primary care trusts and councils
in forthcoming reforms to PCTs, writes Mithran
Samuel.
 
In a report this week, the community well-being board says ensuring
councils and PCTs serve the same communities would support the
government’s ambitions for ever closer working between social
care and health.
 
The Department of Health is due to publish a
“fitness-for-purpose” review on PCTs, which will look
at their boundaries among other issues.
 
County councils will typically have a number of PCTs within their
boundaries, while authorities and trusts in urban areas will more
often have common frontiers.
 
The LGA report says the government’s future policy direction,
embodied in the adult green paper and plans for a white paper on
out-of-hospital healthcare, entailed much closer partnership
working.
 
It also calls for councils to be given a leading role in the
healthcare white paper.
 
The report is available from http://www.lga.gov.uk/About.asp?lsection=758&ccat=921.