CHERIE: Community Health Education, scReenIng and prEvention

Problem: We know that people who live in poverty, in deprived neighbourhoods, are likely to become ill early in life, and die prematurely. They are more likely to develop diabetes and heart disease, and struggle with their complications for many years. Health checks help people understand their risk of getting these conditions, and get the support they need to reduce that risk.

These health checks include measuring the person's weight, height, blood pressure, blood glucose levels, cholesterol levels and kidney function.

Most of these health checks are done in the GP practice. The patients' register is searched to identify those who are potentially at a high risk of developing serious health conditions. Then, the identified patients are contacted to prompt them to book a blood test appointment, followed by another appointment if needed to discuss the results of the health checks.

However, people living in deprivation often struggle to get these health checks done, due to the difficulty of booking GP appointments, or attending them because of work, caring responsibilities and/ or other circumstances.

Solution: CHERIE clinics (Community Health Education, scReerIning and prevEntion) can address most barriers preventing people from accessing these important health checks. There are small portable machines that can perform these health checks using a small sample of blood or urine, and provide the test results in a few minutes. This is known as point of care testing.

We suggest that community groups, with the right training and support from GP surgeries, use point of care testing to offer these health checks in convenient venues within the community.

Benefits: People can access these clinics without an appointment, get their health checks done and receive the support they need based on their results immediately. Offering these health checks in community venues will provide extra time and flexibility to help those struggling with GP appointments. This way, we may identify more people who are at risk of getting ill, early, and offer them the support they need to remain healthy.

This approach will also enable community organisations to seek funding from healthcare commissioners and ensure the sustainability of their services to local communities.

Project aim: Having already established the feasibility of CHERIE clinics, we aim to extend their scope and explore with GPs, patients, community organisations and commissioners how these clinics can be delivered safely and effectively. We will also develop resources to help community organisations bid for funding, and healthcare commissioners develop contractual and commissioning frameworks to support community organisations.