“Things are still hard. But we have a sense of possibility, hope, invigoration even.”

From ideas in the surgery coffee room, to a new way of working in primary care. GP Dr Gillian Orrow on how Growing Health Together flipped how health was done, with big results.

🧵newlocal.org.uk/articles/uptur…

As a GP, Dr Orrow's patients were coming in with 'different stories but the same message'.

“I wouldn’t be depressed if I had more friends', 'My children wouldn’t be obese if I knew how to cook,” “My diabetes would be manageable if the pavements weren't cracked & I could cycle”.

'After years of hearing accounts like this, I had to ask myself – is it enough to just be pushing out pills or should we go out to improve things?'

Dr Orrow began conversations w/colleagues, local people, the council, schools, asking what should be done to improve health.

'We met incredibly passionate people who could see massive problems in area but who had no means to access resources to put these ideas into practice.'

These conversations were the seed of Growing Health Together - giving funding, mentoring & space to ppl who wanted to run activities.

Today there are a myriad of groups: peer support for carers, creative arts sessions for refugees, community food-growing, inclusive golf, perinatal support, African cultural events...

It has unleashed a local 'gift economy', writes Dr Orrow.

GPs have changed how they work too. In 5 PCNs, Surrey Heartlands Health and Care Partnership funds them to spend some of working week on these initiatives.

Local providers have pledged to look at the neighbourhood-level first in their service design, prioritising prevention as well as service delivery.

It's about moving from an industrial to an ecological approach to health.

'We invert the foundational assumptions of healthcare. Rather than start with diseases and how to fix them, we start with the evidence base on health and the conditions in which it is created.'

'The impact upon the vitality of our local healthcare system is already genuinely palpable,' says Dr Orrow.

'I implore anyone excited by such a vision to give it a try.'

Interested? Read the full story 👉 newlocal.org.uk/articles/uptur…