A Healthy Partnership

The first meeting of the Thamesmead Health and Wellbeing Partnership was held on 8 May at the Trust’s Head Office. This is a new strategic forum which includes officers from Bexley and Greenwich councils (including public health), Gallions Housing Association and the Trust and our key partners, most notable of which is the Greenwich Cooperative Development Agency.

The Partnership is seeking to help create the best social outcomes around improved health, building on the significant regeneration resources already secured for Thamesmead and those promised over the next five to fifteen years.

In the coming months the Partnership will be looking to better understand the local health data and agree shared priorities for the partners to focus on.

The group will then be taking an ‘asset based’ approach to health Improvement, mapping individuals, groups, networks and community facilities that can be developed to make an evidenced impact on improving the health of Thamesmead residents.

The forum will also aim to coordinate funding applications that have the potential to make health-related behaviour changes, particularly around smoking, physical activity, diet and mental well-being.

The Trust has already secured funding from the Bexley Family Health programme and is now prioritising a bid to Sport England’s Community Activation Fund.

Claire Pritchard of Greenwich Cooperative development Agency said: “The inaugural meeting was a huge success with all the partners playing their part. We are about to embark on a very exciting agenda in an area of huge need but which also offers great potential for doing things better and in a different way.”