Successes for Lancashire Primary Care teams at this year’s General Practice Awards

Four local GP teams have been recognised at a prestigious event honouring excellence and innovation in primary care across the UK.

Last month’s General Practice Awards saw hundreds of nominations made across 20 categories, with almost 650 healthcare and industry professionals attending the ceremony on 29 November. Three awards were won by Lancashire teams, with local teams also highly commended in two categories.

Darwen Healthcare scooped both the Practice Nursing Award and GP Team of the Year.

Dr Ridwaan Ahmed, Clinical Director of Quality and Primary Care for NHS Blackburn with Darwen CCG, said:

“We are absolutely delighted for Darwen Healthcare. The team work extremely hard, so these two awards in addition to an ‘outstanding’ rating by the Care Quality Commission is truly well deserved.”

Primary Care Networks (PCNs) are partnerships between a few local GP practices and other health and care services across a local area. They have developed across England in response to the NHS Long Term Plan, published in January 2019, to help join-up these services. Reflecting these changes to the NHS landscape, four new categories were added to this year’s awards.

Healthier Fleetwood Neighbourhood, also known as Fleetwood PCN, was crowned Primary Care Network of the Year.

Mark Spencer, Clinical Lead for Fleetwood PCN said:

“This award is great boost as we have been working hard to bring health services together and encouraging residents to take an active role to make Fleetwood a healthier place.”

Chorley Central PCN was highly commended for Primary Care Network of the Year.

Dr Shashidhar Khandavalli, a GP partner at The Chorley Surgery and Clinical Director for Chorley Central PCN, said:

“Recognising that we can make a bigger difference if we work together, the Chorley Central network has been at the forefront of improving local people’s health in new ways. We are really lucky to have strong relationships with some incredibly forward-thinking services and organisations. The success of our work so far would not have been possible without all of their collective efforts.”

The Thornton Practice in Lancashire were also highly commended for GP Team of the Year.