Hospitals, GPs surgeries, mental health services and care for the elderly is rarely out of the news - but do you know how our local NHS works?
There are myriad services with confusing names like ‘orthopaedics’, ‘fluoroscopy’ and ‘cognitive behavioural therapy’.
To muddy the waters further, they are delivered by a mixture of public and private organisations.
Our little guide should help you understand who provides your free healthcare and where to find it should you need it.
Hospitals
Huddersfield Royal Infirmary and Calderdale Royal Hospital, Halifax, are run by Calderdale and Huddersfield Foundation Trust. It is an NHS organisation - publicly owned and publicly run.
Dewsbury District Hospital and Pinderfields in Wakefield are run by Mid Yorkshire Hospitals Trust, which performs a similar role.
As well as the most apparent services, such as emergency care and maternity services, these hospitals carry out a wide variety of inpatient (you're staying in hospital) and outpatient (you’re not staying) services.
They can have strange sounding clinical names so here are a few with a layman’s translation: cardiology (heart), dermatology (skin), ENT (ear, nose and throat), fluoroscopy (x-ray to see inside organs), haematology (blood), neonatal (newborns), orthopaedics (bones, joints and muscles) palliative (end of life care), pathology (tests e.g. blood, urine).
The trusts may also employ private health providers such as BMI to carry out operations if there is a long waiting list in NHS hospitals.
Community care
In 2015 the bulk of this was awarded to Locala, an independent, not-for-profit organisation.
It delivers a wide variety of out-of-hospital and home services including: mother and baby clinics, children’s speech therapy, dentistry, diabetes care, drug and alcohol help, health visiting, immunisation, physiotherapy and sexual health.
Services are usually run at GP surgeries and health centres.
Locala recently bought the Princess Royal Health Centre, Greenhead Road, so an increasing proportion of services will be moved there over the next five years.
Locala also performs smaller operations for feet (podiatry), the nervous system (neurology) and other body parts.
Ambulances
Emergency ambulances throughout Yorkshire are run by the Yorkshire Ambulance Service.
The trust has stations in Huddersfield and Honley but due to the busy nature of the job ambulances are more likely to carry out back-to-back jobs from hospital to hospital.
General Practices (GPs)
The majority are run by the doctors themselves with funding which comes directly from the NHS.
Mental health
NHS mental health services in Huddersfield are delivered by South West Yorkshire Foundation Trust.
It is responsible for the providing treatment for autistic spectrum disorders, eating disorders and common mental illnesses such as anxiety, depression and obsessive compulsive disorder.
It runs community mental health clinics as well as secure wards for patients with acute mental health issues.
Public health
Broad health issues such as smoking, obesity and illness outbreaks fall under the ‘public health’ banner.
Local authorities, in this case Kirklees Council, are responsible for awareness campaigns and prevention strategies.
Who manages all this?
Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs)
Greater Huddersfield CCG decides what NHS services the town needs and is responsible for commissioning and purchasing those services.
CCGs are led by an elected governing board comprising GPs, a nurse, a secondary care consultant and lay members.
It is responsible to Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt.
