Healthcare who’s who

Healthcare who’s who

The health and care landscape has always been complicated to understand, and changes to the NHS architecture seem to happen on a fairly regular basis, sometimes introducing new bodies and service commissioners that community pharmacy must engage with.

The links below will take you to website pages describing the role of the main bodies in the healthcare landscape.

Resources for LPCs and pharmacy teams

NHS England published Understanding the new NHS – A guide for everyone working and training within the NHS in June 2014.  This brief booklet was written by five doctors in training and it outlines the organisations, systems and processes that define, sustain and regulate the NHS. As such the document provides a quick guide for community pharmacy teams that want to refresh their knowledge of how the NHS works.

The Department of Health and Social Care’s Guide to the Healthcare System in England is an alternative resource which describes the healthcare system and the main bodies which operate within it. It will be a useful educational/CPD resource for pharmacy contractors, pharmacists and pre-registration students.

The King’s Fund – Animation – How does the NHS in England work? (Oct 2017)

National leadership bodies

Commissioners and local organisations

Regulators and public voice

Health policy commentators, think tanks and charities

The links below are for the websites of organisations that regularly issue policy documents or other materials on health policy issues.

King’s Fund

Nuffield Trust

The Health Foundation

NHS Confederation

Other bodies



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