West Lancashire Adult Community and Urgent Care Services
In 2017, we were appointed by NHS West Lancashire Clinical Commissioning Group to build an integrated, resilient and sustainable adult community services and unscheduled care service for the district.
Our aims were to:
- Bring care closer to home
- To achieve collective accountability working in partnership with the whole health economy
- To build a sustainable, resilient community service
- To reduce avoidable admission
- Introduce new technology to support efficiencies, information sharing and remote monitoring
- Offer virtual consultations
- Provide virtual support/education sessions
- Improve patient outcomes for people of West Lancashire
Community
More than 150 people have benefited from our pulmonary rehab programme, which is delivered out in the community in an area of West Lancashire where emergency hospital admissions for COPD are significantly above the England average.
Quality
West Lancashire Urgent Treatment Centre and Skelmersdale Walk In Centre both received ‘good’ ratings from the Care Quality Commission in 2020.
People
91% of patients report that they feel involved in decisions about their care and treatment and 96% feel they are treated with dignity and respect (From latest Patient Reported Experience Measures report)

Over the past three years, we have:
- Brought community service colleagues, previously dotted around the district, together in to two bases – Bickerstaffe House at Ormskirk and District General Hospital and Clayton House in Burscough (now our District Nursing base).
- Developed our district nursing hub, providing colleagues with new equipment, processes and training to help them do their jobs. We’ve increased the number of phlebotomists and supported colleagues in gaining Specialist Practitioner Qualifications.
- Opened our Diabetes and Community Services Centre at Bickerstaffe House in August 2018. In March 2019, Diabetic Retinopathy Eye Screening (DRES), a service provided by Aintree Hospitals NHS Trust, co-located within our Diabetic and Community Services Centre to offer patients eye screening locally within Ormskirk.
- Launched a successful pulmonary rehabilitation programme for patients with lung conditions like asthma and COPD. This was the first time such a programme was available in a community setting in West Lancashire.
- Refurbished Skelmersdale Walk In Centre to create more consulting rooms. This allows community teams to deliver clinics and care closer to patients living in Skelmersdale. We created dedicated areas in both West Lancashire Urgent Treatment Centre and Skelmersdale Walk In Centre for sick children to provide a calm and therapeutic environment, and recruited paramedics, with their unique set of skills, to provide additional support to patients at the urgent care centres.
- Launched our Short Intensive Support Service in 2019, offering patients care in their own homes and helping to avoid unnecessary admissions to A&E.
- Began hosting the Macmillan Cancer Information and Support Service on behalf of Macmillan and NHS West Lancashire Clinical Commissioning Group.
- Partnered with local colleges and universities including West Lancashire College and Edge Hill University and offer work experience placements for health and social care students. We are also offering placements to trainee GPs at Edge Hill University’s new medical school from autumn 2020.
- Drawn on new technology and innovation. We have introduced mobile working for front line staff so they can spend more time out in the community with patients without having to travel back and to from office bases, and have also begun offering virtual consultations and sessions to give people more choice about how they access our services.
- Launched our Care Co-ordination Hub, which sits at the heart of our West Lancashire operations.
- Procured and implemented an assistive technology service, on behalf of NHS West Lancashire CCG, to offer a free 12-week package of support for vulnerable patients during the COVID-19 pandemic.
- Developed an enhanced discharge planning service, running 7 days a week from 8am-8pm, to support Southport and Ormskirk NHS Trust in helping patients experience a smooth transition from hospital back in to the community during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Our vision
We will continue to work in West Lancashire to deliver our bid promises and considerable additional value to commissioners, the community and our colleagues.
A visionary, driving influence in the district, we want our communities to be our champions and our patients, partners in their own care. We will continue to positively engage and be visible with stakeholders. Our colleagues will be recognised as transformation champions.
We will strive to achieve outstanding CQC inspections and continue to bring innovation and inspiration to our services.
If you’d like to find out more about how we can help change people’s lives through the transformation of health and care in your area, please contact us.

Featured News
Another ‘good’ CQC inspection for our urgent care centres in West Lancashire
Skelmersdale Walk-In Centre has been recognised for going above and beyond to help patients get the care they need in its latest Care Quality Commission (CQC) inspection.

Featured Case Study
Preventing avoidable hospital admissions and facilitating rehabilitation with a rapid response service
Our multi-disciplinary CERT team has been in place in West Lancashire since 2014, providing a rapid response service and this has provided some amazing results for people.

Featured Case Study
Transforming support in the community for respiratory patients
As part of our adult community services portfolio in West Lancashire, we are responsible for the care of a large cohort of respiratory patients. In 2019/20 alone, our respiratory team provided assessment, advice and intervention to 490 patients.
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