Ways to Wellness UK

26/11/2025

👋 Visit us today at the Developing NHS Innovation Conference in London!

This event brings together patient groups, government organisations, industry partners and NHS teams to accelerate the adoption of new healthcare innovations.

We’re delighted to be part of the exhibition. Say hello and pick up a Ways to Wellness tote bag before they're gone.

Let’s shape the future of healthcare together. 🌟

20/11/2025

Fantastic to be at the Population Health 2025 Conference on giving all children the 'Strongest Start', where our Head of Implementation Ang Broadbridge is a panellist.

Key messages so far have included “let’s 'Think Child' with urgency”, and how vital lived experience is to shaping practice.

It has also been great to hear among delegates that social prescribing and the VCSE sector are seen as key players crucial to the overall picture.

One standout statistic to consider is the fact it costs a family £35 for a paediatric outpatient appointment, factoring in travel, time off work, and food.

All in all today is serving to act as a rallying cry to urgently invest in our children and families!

https://centreforpopulationhealth.co.uk/2025-conference

19/11/2025

Over the past few months we've been grateful to partner with Northumberland FA on a new, fully-inclusive programme of football training for young people with health challenges that have made training in mainstream settings difficult.

Hear from participants Nate and Louis, Nate's Dad Paul, and some of the team members involved in this fantastic film about the initiative made with support from The Bigger Picture.

And thank you to England Football and the FA Journey to Inclusion Fund for making this all possible!

Ways to Wellness is excited to have joined forces with Northumberland Football Association (FA), which has led on helping us ensure more of the region’s youn...

18/11/2025

Many people ask us about how we take an idea from kernel stage to full test-and-learn prototype. Wonder no more - our Head of Development Simon Bromhead has explained all in our latest blog post

Getting from an innovative idea to a deliverable prototype can be a nuanced process that involves many factors. Our Head of Development Simon Bromhead, explains the Ways to Wellness  approach to making it happen.

17/11/2025

Don't forget about the Fuse, the Centre for Translational Research in Public Health, Early Life and Adolescence cluster lunchtime seminar tomorrow.

We will be talking about SPACE CYP (Social Prescribing And Community rEsources for Children and Young People) pilot; our family-centred hospital-initiated social prescribing service.

📍 Where: Online
📅 Date: Tue, 18 Nov 2025, Noon

You can learn more about how social prescribing can help children with complex needs and their families by taking a whole-family approach.

The SPACE Pilot is a partnership project between Ways to Wellness, the Great North Children's Hospital and Newcastle University.

Anna Basu, Lauren Loader and Ang Broadbridge will share insights from the pilot.



https://fuse.ac.uk/events/fuseresearchevents/earlylifeandadolescenceclusterlunchtimeseminar.html

11/11/2025

🏆 We were honoured to be part of the team that received the ‘Partnership Working’ award at The Newcastle upon Tyne Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust Celebrating Excellence Awards, recognising our work on the TAPER2 programme.

TAPER2 brought together healthcare professionals, social prescribers, including the Ways to Wellness PROSPeR (Perioperative Social Prescribing) team, and the Deep End Network of GP practices to support people to ‘wait well’ for surgery through opioid deprescribing and social prescribing.

TAPER2 saw:

64% overall reduction in analgesic prescriptions
74% of patients supported by Ways to Wellness reduced opioids by more than half

Read more in our blog to see how collaboration across Primary and Secondary care, community organisations, and VCSE partners can deliver real improvements for patients and the wider health system.

https://www.waystowellness.org.uk/newsblogs/ways-to-wellness-rewarded-for-its-partnership-working-at-the-newcastle-hospitals-celebrating-excellence-awardsnbsp

The TAPER2 team were honoured to receive the Partnership Working award at the recent Newcastle upon Tyne Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust ’s annual Celebrating Excellence Awards, in recognition of their collaborative approach to helping people ‘wait well’ for surgery through opioid deprescribing...

10/11/2025

🎬 Join us this Thursday at Tullie, Carlisle, Cumbria, for a special screening of ‘See the Whole of Me’ - a short animation inspired by the experiences of a diverse group of Cumbrian mums.

This powerful 3-and-a-half-minute film shares the voices of women from seldom-heard communities, who too often feel unseen or excluded within the healthcare system.

Come along to hear from all the partners who contributed to this project, and join the conversation on the transformational power of listening for new and mums-to-be.

The event will include a drinks reception, an animation screening, and talks, with an exclusive first look at the exhibition to follow throughout the next week at Tullie.

📅 Date: 5pm, Thursday 13 November 2025
📍 Location: Tullie, Carlisle, Cumbria
🔗 Sign up: https://tullie.org.uk/events/happy-mums-foundation-see-the-whole-of-me-film-screening/

The Happy Mums Foundation Newcastle University Cumbria CVS Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council Roots and Wings

06/11/2025

Celebrating !

As we nearly come to the end of , we’re highlighting the depth of experience our trustees bring to the table.

At Ways to Wellness, we know how vital the voluntary, community and social enterprise (VCSE) sector is in keeping people well and reducing .

Having trustees who understand both the VCSE sector and how it works alongside the NHS and wider healthcare system helps us strengthen partnerships and work across sectors to improve people’s wellbeing.

Our trustees have:

➡️ Founded and grown voluntary and community organisations from the ground up
➡️ Led a mental health charity as CEO for more than a decade
➡️ Advised VCSE organisations on finance, governance and effective frameworks
➡️ Served on boards across everything from therapeutic horticulture to healthcare innovation

This collective expertise informs the way we work at Ways to Wellness, helping us tackle health inequalities through collaboration.

We want to say a huge thank you to our Trustees!

Professor Chris Drinkwater, Dr Guy Pilkington, Brendan Hill, Professor David Hunter, Mary Jordan, John Spurr, Dr Ruth Briel, Dr Robert Westgate, Dr Leahan Garratt.

👉 Meet our Board: https://www.waystowellness.org.uk/meet-our-board

05/11/2025

Great to be at today's The King's Fund annual conference looking at courage, honesty and the future of healthcare.

The first panel, featuring King's Fund CEO Sarah Woolnough, Medical Director of NHS Lancashire and South Cumbria Andy Knox MBE, Derbyshire-based mental health nurse CJ Nwasike, Kent care home manager Judy Heathfield-Eliott, and Dr Jess Steele OBE, of Jericho Road Solutions, looked at how we create a system that is responsive to need, given the gigantic impact of poverty on services.

But the 10-year plan is full of possibility, and we know that well thought out policies can change outcomes for good. Getting the admin right as part of this is crucial, and we must take into account people's experience of receiving post-appointment letters, the timing of appointments for those who may have to travel a long way to attend for example.

Patients can have very good clinical care, but often feel let down when negotiating the system.

04/11/2025

Read our latest blog post by Head of Implementation Ang Broadbridge to understand the factors beyond technology that are central to innovation at Ways to Wellness -

The term innovation is used a lot when talking about health these days. Frequently coupled with digital and the evolution of Artificial Intelligence (AI), it is often viewed only through a technical lens, and technological advancements are undoubtedly part of the picture. But valuable aspects that c

03/11/2025

It’s Trustees’ Week, and at Ways to Wellness, we are fortunate to have a board with a breadth of healthcare expertise.

Many of our Trustees are clinicians, including GPs, a psychiatrist, a mental health nurse, and a psychologist, who have spent decades working in the communities most affected by health inequalities.

They bring a lifelong commitment to supporting communities and developing innovative approaches to address health inequalities, both at an individual and systemic level.

Their valuable and extensive knowledge of healthcare and the NHS strengthens all our pilots and prototypes, ensuring they can make a real difference for the people and systems we serve.

We want to say a huge thank you to our Trustees!

Professor Chris Drinkwater, Dr Guy Pilkington, Brendan Hill, Professor David Hunter, Mary Jordan, John Spurr, Dr Ruth Briel, Dr Robert Westgate, Dr Leahan Garratt.

👉 Meet our Board: https://www.waystowellness.org.uk/meet-our-board

[Photo of founder and former chair Professor Chris Drinkwater and current chair Dr Guy Pilkington at the Ways to Wellness and Blue Stone Collaborative merger event in 2022]