Active Medicine Programme

"If the effects of exercise could be bottled it would be the medicine of the century" ... but, it only works 'if people take the pill'

We are delighted to be working in a new and exciting collaborative partnership with Active Oxfordshire and LEAP (the Active Partnerships for Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire respectively) and the NHS Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire West Prevention Group to deliver a Sport England funded Workforce Innovation Project that we have called the 'Active Medicine Programme'

This web-page will be the online resource for this two year project and it will evolve as the project starts and grows.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) states: ‘It is clear that if health professionals prescribe exercise or provide counselling on physical activity, their patients will be more active’

The Aim of this project is to:

• Increase levels of physical activity in those patients currently inactive or with low levels of activity through positive interactions with health care professionals
• In health care professionals:
  • Raise the understanding of the IMPORTANCE of physical activity in disease prevention and management and
  • Improve CONFIDENCE for promoting and discussing Physical Activity
• Learning: what works and what doesn't; how to deliver at scale; how to transfer best practice

The Programme Objectives are to:

1. Identify, develop and deliver upskilling and support to key health staff ('the workforce') around Physical Activity (PA)
2. Develop training around behaviour change for PA, greater knowledge of the benefits of PA and signposting specifically in relation to PA
3. Develop (and collate) on-line and offline resource materials
4. Develop a process for accurate signposting to PA opportunities
5. Develop a hub for staff to share experiences and best practice and for evaluation and measurement of impact
6. Ensure integration and use of resources already available (Moving Medicine, MECC, Clinical Champions for example).
7. Share learning across the network

Links to key source documents:

Programme Manager Job Opportunity

As part of this programme we will shortly be looking to recruit a Programme Manager. The job description and Application forms can be downloaded below.

This role requires an experienced and dynamic individual to design and deliver the programme to provide an uplift in skills, knowledge and confidence to health sector staff to enable them to have more productive and useful conversations around physical activity with patients.

The Programme Manager (PM) will be required to work collaboratively across all connected organisations including the 3 Prevention Boards covering Oxfordshire, Buckinghamshire and Berkshire West to identify the initial recipients of the uplift training and to design and organise delivery of this training appropriately across the 'patch'. This innovation project must also be fully evaluated to ensure learning can be developed for transfer more widely across the Active Partnership network. Significant relationships have already been brokered across NHS/PH/CCG organisations within the BOB STP footprint and with academic institutions; the role of the PM will be to expand and consolidate these as in-roads into key target institutions.

For an informal discussion please contact brett.nicholls@getberkshireactive.org

Current Resources

There has already been some excellent work done and resources produced to support medical staff promote the benefits of physical activity to patients. The role of the Active Medicine Programme is not to reinvent the wheel and duplicate what's already available but rather to help these resources land locally and be used to best effect.