NHS bosses in Staffordshire need to save £306 million this year – but say they are 'absolutely committed' to maintaining service quality.

Health service organisations in the county have come up with a raft of money-saving schemes after being told by NHS England to make the cuts to their 2025/26 operational budgets.

Plans include reviewing people's ongoing care to ensure it is not 'overly restrictive', reducing the reliance on agency staff and 'rationalising' the NHS estate in Staffordshire.

Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent Integrated Care Board (ICB), which commissions NHS services, needs to make £170 million of savings, while University Hospitals of North Midlands, the county's biggest NHS provider, has to save £75 million.

Midlands Partnership NHS Foundation Trust has to save £54.2 million, and North Staffordshire Combined Healthcare has to save £7.4 million. NHS bosses were quizzed on their savings plans by members of Stoke-on-Trent's health and wellbeing board.

Elizabeth Disney, chief transformation officer at the ICB, told the meeting that the £306 million savings target represented a 'significant total', equating to around nine per cent of NHS spending in the county.

But she insisted that all changes to services were being impact assessed and scrutinised, with engagement with partners such as the health and wellbeing board.

Ms Disney said: "We're being very careful about the changes that we're going to implement to deliver those financial totals. We're thoroughly impact assessing the nature of those changes.

"Largely speaking there are lots of transformation schemes, lots of productivity and efficiency schemes. The changes, wherever possible, are not about reducing care.

"It's about creating a values-based health care system – ensuring the right clinically appropriate care is delivered."

Ms Disney claimed that reviewing care packages could ensure better outcomes while costing less money.

She added: "We do think there is an opportunity to ensure there are timely reviews of people's care so we're not providing overly restrictive care that doesn't help people regain independence.

"We think there's opportunity to manage the market differently. In that quality improvement there could be an opportunity for financial savings."

Workforce changes will include reducing use of bank staff, holding more posts vacant, and ensuring staffing is planned to reflect new models of care.

The organisations will also aim to improve the oversight of contracts, and increase productivity, which has reduced in the NHS since the pandemic.

UHNM chief executive Simon Constable said the ICB and NHS providers had a '100 per cent commitment' to service quality and performance.

He said: "We find ourselves in a really challenging situation. The money is the money, and you've got to live within your means and make it work.

"Clearly we've got some tough choices to make. But a big chunk of the ask is around productivity, which none of us are contesting. We have to do more with less or the same amount of money. We take that on the chin."

Duncan Walker, cabinet member for adult social care at Stoke-on-Trent City Council, acknowledged the financial pressures facing the NHS, but said councillors had 'legitimate concerns' over how the changes would affect Potteries residents.

He raised particular concerns over the NHS reducing its contribution to people's continuing healthcare (CHC).

Cllr Walker said: "This will be a cost-shunt onto residents, who will need to contribute to their own care, and to the local authority, who do not have the budget for this.

"How can this change be justified when we know our residents have higher than average levels of multiple long-term health conditions together with high levels of social deprivation?"

Ms Disney insisted that the ICB would be applying the same CHC assessments as other NHS systems, and that affected patients would be able to access services such as GPs and community nurses.

She said: "The point of the continuing healthcare review is not to shift costs onto anyone else, but to meet people's health needs through services that are already commissioned."

Scrutiny committee members at the city council will have the chance to examine the NHS plans in more detail during their meeting in July.

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