Buckinghamshire Healthcare NHS Trust is a major provider of community and hospital services in South Central England, providing care to over half a million patients from Buckinghamshire and neighbouring counties every year.

We are responsible for the majority of NHS care in the county, from community health services provided in people’s homes or from one of our many local bases, to acute hospital services at Stoke Mandeville, Wycombe and Amersham.

Our ambition is to provide comprehensive networks of care aimed at giving patients the right treatment and support, in the right place, at the right time. Over 6,000 highly trained doctors, nurses, midwives, health visitors, therapists, healthcare scientists and other support staff make up our workforce, caring for the full spectrum of patients from newborn babies to elderly people needing help to maintain living independently at home.

As well as being a major provider of community and general hospital care, we are renowned for our specialist services. Stoke Mandeville Hospital is home to the internationally recognised National Spinal Injuries Centre, one of only 11 such centres of expertise in the UK. We are also a regional centre for burn care, plastic surgery and dermatology, and recognised nationally for our urology and skin cancer services.

Where your needs always come first

What makes Buckinghamshire Healthcare NHS Trust different is our pledge to ensure that ‘your needs always come first’. This is embodied in our promises to provide clean and safe practice, clinics and hospitals a caring, helpful and respectful attitude, respect for your time, easy access to comfortable and modern facilities and the best clinical care. Our commitment is to give you the highest standards of care.

We are proud of our recent track record in keeping our promises and transforming the quality of our services. With a ‘good’ rating for quality of services from the Care Quality Commission in its national Annual Health Check, we continue to address the issues that matter most to patients. For example, our low waiting times for planned surgery continue to be among the best nationally, as do our low rates of hospital acquired infections such as MRSA and C.difficile. Our staff now routinely screen for MRSA the vast majority of patients admitted to our hospitals.

We are constantly looking at opportunities to improve our environments and facilities, with a range of projects planned such as improved car parking and outreach initiatives across the Trust.

A major priority for us now is to gain NHS Foundation Trust status. Such an achievement would give our local community more of a say in the future development of our services, and the organisation greater independence from central control to meet local needs.

About the local NHS and partnership working

Buckinghamshire Healthcare NHS Trust is part of the NHS and a service provider organisation. Since April 2010 we have been responsible for both the county’s acute hospital and community health services. Community health services include district nursing, health visiting, intermediate care, occupational and physiotherapy, community dental services, speech and language therapy and palliative care.

The NHS is split into 10 regions that are overseen by strategic health authorities. Strategic health authorities are in charge of all NHS health services in their area, making sure they are run well and improving. South Central Strategic Health Authority is responsible for Buckinghamshire and also covers the counties of Berkshire, Oxfordshire, Hampshire and the Isle of Wight.

We work closely with GPs and NHS Buckinghamshire, the local primary care trust, which is the main commissioner of our services. Primary care trusts (PCTs) are responsible for assessing local needs, commissioning care, and improving public health.

There is strong partnership working between the NHS and the local authority Buckinghamshire County Council, which is responsible for providing social care. A good example of this relationship is within children, young people and families’ services. We have an over-arching Local Safeguarding Children’s Board which is hosted by the county council. Visit our joint website here.

Useful web links:

NHS Buckinghamshire
Buckinghamshire County Council
South Central Strategic Health Authority