Hauraki locality update - June 2022

As communicated previously, the Hauraki and Tūwharetoa (Taupō-Tūrangi) localities have been selected as two of nine locality prototypes. Last month we had a specific focus on the Tūwharetoa locality prototype and work continues on this. Let’s turn our attention to the Hauraki locality prototype, as the second locality prototype in which Pinnacle and it’s practices have a key role to play.

The Hauraki Māori Trust Board is the legislated tribal authority representing the 12 iwi of Pare Hauraki and are providing iwi leadership for the locality. The Trust has nominated Hauraki PHO to be the lead organisation to support the implementation of the locality prototype.

Pinnacle has an important contribution to make in the Hauraki locality and we are collaborating with Iwi, Waikato DHB (as it exists in its current form until 1 July 2022), Hauraki PHO and National Hauora Coalition to form the ‘backbone support’ for the locality. Our contributions to the locality approach are being actively sought, particularly given our involvement the Tūwharetoa prototype.

An authentic, high-trust, honest relationship is one of the foundations of collaboration and we continue to demonstrate our willingness to be part of the solution. 

The vision of the locality is to increase the health and wellbeing of Māori and other whānau across Pare Hauraki. The ‘korowai’ or cloak is the metaphor used to describe the ‘collective impact’ approach to bringing people and providers together to achieve this vision. This vision will be elaborated on through the Locality Charter – a document which the backbone support organisations have agreed to call a Collaboration Agreement.

In addition to the continuity of core and essential services, priorities addressing health inequities for Māori in the prototype proposal included:

• making access possible
• co-designing after hours and urgent primary and mental health service
• establishing the Thames Hospital Healthcare Hub
• integrating Mental health and Addiction Services
• prioritising screening and preventative care.

A key activity will be taking the aspirations of the proposal and turning them into a detailed workplan with accountabilities and timeframes. Some preliminary discussions have been held.

An initial ‘kick-off’ meeting between interim Health NZ, interim Māori Health Authority and key locality stakeholder organisations was held 9 May. The focus was whakawhanaungatanga and detailed discussions around Iwi-Māori Partnership Boards (IMPB).

The exact locality boundary is still being worked through by several Iwi-Māori Partnership Boards so we will wait for this to be confirmed. Once clarified, we propose to tweak the cluster groups to ensure all practices in the Hauraki locality meet as a collective and grow our understanding of locality planning. 

Backbone organisations have met to flesh out the draft Collaboration Agreement and to consider how we move into the next phase of locality development.  

Our locality mahi is being led by Katie Latimer, general manager: strategic development. Once the locality work programme is more established, Jayne Emerson (Waikato network lead) and Bevan Bayne (regional services lead) will be key contributors, as well as our practice development facilitators. 

At this stage we don’t have a lot of extra detail. This provides time to ensure the voices, ideas, challenges faced, and solutions offered by general practice and primary care are strongly represented through the locality collective in a way that works for our members, practices and teams. 

With this in mind, we’d love to hear from our Hauraki, Thames and Coromandel colleagues on what works best for you. Here are some ideas on how we might stay connected and ensure local primary care voices and solutions are captured and brought to the locality for consideration. 

• Re-start locality peer group meetings – specifically for locality GPs, practice nurse leads and practice managers, held in person preferably, or virtually.  We need your feedback on the frequency of these.   
• Establish locality focus groups – organised around the five priorities mentioned above. Held quarterly, in person preferably, or virtually. 
• Leverage existing cluster meetings, with some tweaking to include all Hauraki locality practices – currently held for Pinnacle members, held quarterly, in person preferably, or virtually. 
• Leverage existing practice-based operational meetings – we are happy to attend your practice meetings by invitation, or on a regular basis.

We suspect that combinations of the options above might work best but please get in touch to share your thoughts on these options or other ways of staying connected.