Part of 2. Questions to the Minister for Health and Social Services – in the Senedd at 2:22 pm on 16 February 2022.
Diolch yn fawr, Vikki, and I read the report, 'No place like home', with interest, and I agree with very many of the recommendations and I'm very pleased to say that we're already delivering in many of the areas that have been set out there. There's nobody, I don't think, who is more keen to get people back into their homes when they're ready for discharge from hospitals than I am. I'm very keen to get on with the programme of really addressing the backlog. And, obviously, while we have over 1,000 people in our hospitals waiting for discharge who are ready to get home, then clearly we need to take measures to make sure that's possible.
I'm very pleased to say that, as part of the action that we took in this space over the winter months, we have been holding weekly meetings, both the Deputy Minister Julie Morgan and I, with local government and health boards to try and ease that process of getting people out of hospitals. And you'll be aware that recently we announced £144 million of funding for the regional integration fund over five years, and some of the key themes in that really address the issues that you're interested in, which is basically looking at community-based care, home from hospital care, place-based care and, of course, in addition to that, we have the six goals for the urgent and emergency care handbook that were set out last week, and that is looking at safe alternatives to hospital admissions, a home-first approach and an attempt to reduce that risk of readmission. So, we already have, of course, examples of virtual wards, which have been talked about in that report, and the hospital at home service, and I'm very keen to see those models rolled out more extensively across Wales.