Reading's Health and Well-being Board meets for the first time on the afternoon of 21st June 2013. The Health and Well-being Board has oversight of all health and social care (both for adults and for children) for Reading although with limited powers of direct action. Members of the public are welcome to attend and may put questions, to be given in advance. If a detailed answer is expected, the question should be posed several weeks ahead of the meeting.

The NHS Has taken on its new shape as of 1st April 2013 as the Clinical Commissioning Groups take over most procurement of hospital and other secondary level health services. Under the new system South Reading CCG will be responsible for purchasing services for all South Reading patients from community nursing providers and hospitals.

South Reading Patient Voice will meet on Wednesday 24th April at 6pm at the University Health Centre.on Northcourt Avenue. The main presentation will be on Integrated Care and the services delivered in the community to support it. The work of the CCG Programme Boards will also be outlined. There will be a short report on developments in the CCG, on the "dry-run" CCG board meeting in March, and time for discussion of matters raised at the meeting (or preferrably before). There will be elections for vice-chair and outreach officer.

The new shape of health service commissioning introduced by the Health and Social Care Act is already in place and fully running since 1st April 2013. But the regulations governing commissioning are still the subject of debate. Regulations have already been issued twice by the Government, which maintains that they do no more than codify the existing position.

You may have heard that the NHS Direct telephone service is to be replaced by the new 111 service. The 111 service will give advice on health problems and where to seek treatment and will give access to out-of-hours service or ambulance service where necessary. It will run alongside the 999 emergency service which will still give the emergency ambulance service as before.