Health Services
Primary Care
Primary Care Trusts (PCT)s, are the National Health Services
(NHS) responsible for improving the health of the people
living in their area. PCTs plan local health services, in
partnership with local NHS Trusts, local government
and the local community.
A PCT holds the
NHS budget for
the area and uses this money to commission health services for its
local population. PCTs also provide services and these
include community nursing, community physiotherapy, occupational
therapy, speech and language therapy, chiropody and community
hospitals.
PCTs also provide
wheelchair services and home loans, health promotion, child health
services including school nursing, family planning, child health
and child protection and NHS Services in
Schools. Within the area, primary care services are well
developed with all General Practitioner (GP) surgeries providing
services additional to General Medical Services.
Ashford is covered by the East and Coastal Kent Primary
Care Trust.
Secondary Care
As its name suggests, this is the second stage of treatment,
which may follow primary care provided by doctors. It usually
involves a hospital visit as an outpatient or inpatient.
Ambulance
Ambulance trusts provide emergency access to healthcare. The
South East Coast Ambulance
Service covers the whole of Kent, Surrey and
Sussex and also provides patient transport to help some
hospital patients get to hospital.
Patient and Public Involvement (PPI) Forums
These forums replaced Community Health Councils in December 2003
and each NHS
organisation has an PPI Forum assigned to
it. The forums are made up of volunteers from the local
community and act as the watchdog for local health issues.
This webpage was updated on
1/26/2012