Over the last few months, our Head of Digital Systems Sonia Townend has been working with Northern Health Futures Hub, otherwise known as NortHFutures, and Dr Matt Cooper, a researcher from Newcastle University, to pilot a series of workshops designed to help those involved in social prescribing to harness the information at their fingertips so they can use it to secure more opportunities.

With several of these learning clinics having now taken place, in this blog post Sonia tells us about the themes the team has encountered so far.

Hear from our Perioperative Social Prescribing (PROSPeR) project partner Angela Telford, a Specialist Inpatient Pain Nurse with the ‘Waiting Well’ team at The Newcastle upon Tyne Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, who sat down with us to explain how the type of support advocated by Ways to Wellness through all our prototypes, is making a huge difference to patients waiting for surgery.

Hear from our CEO Sandra Mitchell-Phillips about our take on the Downing Street Partnerships Unit devolution update issued to civil society and charity leaders this week.

“We are fortunate that Newcastle upon Tyne has been taking steps towards reducing health inequity by becoming a Marmot city, meaning our local authority is an official partner of the Institute of Health Equity, and is working towards addressing the social factors that impact the health of our citizens…

When Ways to Wellness Team Lead Steffen Laukard met Bournemouth University academic Dr Jonny Branney at last year’s Live Well with Pain conference, where he was a fellow delegate, little did either know how much they would come to champion one another’s work.  

Ways to Wellness is proud to have achieved matrix Standard accreditation, an international standard for information, advice and guidance (IAG) services. 

Our Head of Digital Systems, Sonia Townend, talked about how the matrix Standard can help social prescribing providers demonstrate their impact at the webinar, ‘Defining best practice in social prescribing’.

Returning from the NHS ConfedExpo in Manchester, our CEO, Sandra Mitchell-Phillips, was struck by how much the conversation around the future of health has evolved since the launch of the NHS 10-year plan a year ago.

As policymakers and system leaders increasingly focus on the relationship between health and economic inactivity, the importance of evidence in shaping future approaches continues to grow. At Ways to Wellness, we are reflecting on what this means for social prescribing, and why building confidence in data is key to demonstrating the impact of relationship-based support.

“Conversations about centring citizen’s voices in the implementation of innovation to help reduce inequalities and further the NHS mission towards prevention, were rich and thoughtful…”, writes our Head of Communications and Marketing Jule Coulson, who represented our senior leadership team at Insights North East 2026, “…yet there appeared to be relatively little representation from the private sector. For me, this raised a vital question.”

“The ambition set out at the recent ‘Future Ready: Digital Health for Tomorrow’s NHS’ digital symposium at the Catalyst was clear”, writes our Head of Digital Systems Sonia Townend - “…a health system in which digital access is the default, not the exception.

“Central to that ambition is the continued scaling of the NHS App, positioning it as the front door to healthcare for millions of people.

The findings of the ‘UK Poverty 2026’ report from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation are unsurprising yet shocking. In the wake of years of austerity, followed by the economic impact of a global pandemic and an ongoing cost-of-living crisis, it reveals that poverty is rising dramatically in headline terms.

But the rate at which it is deepening should be of real concern to all of us working in health and care.

Ways to Wellness is proud to have achieved the bronze Better Health at Work award, recognising our ongoing work empowering team members in taking care of their health and wellbeing. 

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.

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 and social prescribing. 

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 can be overlooked in this conversation include creativity, collaboration and co-production, which can be equally crucial to advancement.

As a data-driven organisation, Ways to Wellness has been looking at new digital and technological solutions to ensure the information we capture helps with health system innovation, by fully demonstrating the impact of the non-medical interventions we test, on patients, communities, and healthcare infrastructure – and showcases the difference made by our specialist link workers.  

Ways to Wellness is proud to share this new animation on the transformational power of listening which captures the real voices and mental health experiences of a group of mums and mums-to-be. 

Ways to Wellness CEO Sandra Mitchell-Phillips recently attended The King’s Fund Conference on the government’s 10-year plan for healthcare in England.

Here are her thoughts on the event, which featured keynotes from both Health Secretary Wes Streeting, and North West Mayor Andy Burnham.

Ways to Wellness has joined forces with Northumberland Football Association (FA) to ensure more of the region’s young people can access England’s national sport.

‘Your Move’ is a programme of inclusive training sessions for teenagers with acute or long-term health conditions that make it difficult to take part in traditional footballing environments - made possible by the FA’s Journey to Inclusion Fund.

Change is a given in the healthcare landscape, and while that has always been the case, the shifts taking place currently need to go further than ever before.

Anticipation was therefore rife for months ahead of publication of the government's 10-year plan for healthcare in England. Now it’s out, the system has already begun to react.

The ‘three radical shifts’ the plan is calling for, namely hospital to community, analogue to digital, and sickness to prevention, are admirable aspirations, but I can’t help but feel there are probably more questions than answers at this stage of the game.

Ways to Wellness is looking for a new part-time Head of Finance to join our small, supportive and dedicated Senior Management Team.

Robust and sustainable finance sits at the heart of our organisational strategy, ensuring we are well-positioned to continuously achieve our charitable aims, so we can maximise our impact and meet regulatory obligations.

The successful candidate, who should be a qualified accountant with demonstrable experience of seniority within financial management, preferably gained from within the charitable or public sector, will build strong relationships throughout the organisation and among our partners.

The full-time equivalent salary for this post is £50,000pa (£20,000pa to £25,000pa actual for up to two-and-a-half days a week), and the deadline to apply is 9am on 8 August.