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Nearly 300 people benefitted from our Weston Favell event

NHS Northamptonshire’s Health Roadshow at Weston Favell Shopping Centre was a great success, with a total of 286 health interventions with the public over three days.

For three days (Thursday 30 June – Saturday 2nd July), NHS Northamptonshire and their partners – including Northampton Town Football Club and local cancer charity Crazy Hats – were on hand to promote healthy lifestyles, deliver health assessments, and encourage local people to get more involved in the NHS. As well as information about height, weight and Body Mass Index (BMI), hundreds of shoppers were given advice about cutting down on alcohol, stopping smoking, eating more healthily and preventing longer term health problems such as cancer and stroke.

They were also given the opportunity to sign up for free 1-1 support with a Health Trainer.

The interventions included:
• 120 people spoke to our weight management service (provided by Infinite Joy), of which 70 were referred for a 12 week weight management course.
• 40 people had a lifestyle review as part of our cancer campaign
• 45 people completed an alcohol scratchcard test to look at their own consumption of alcohol, and received information on safe drinking

In addition, NHS staff were on hand to answer questions about NHS reforms, and signed up more than 30 people to NHS Northamptonshire’s Pulse membership scheme, which keeps the public in touch with the latest developments. They also promoted the Choose well campaign to raise awareness of alternative services to Accident and Emergency, such as Minor Injury Units. Over 30 people completed the Choose well scratchcard game, which can also be played online here.

Heidi King, Head of Social Marketing at NHS Northamptonshire, said: "We know that people lead busy lives, so we wanted to take messages out to where people go and make our services more accessible, so a busy shopping centre provides the ideal vehicle to do this.

"It’s really important that we go out to the community in person and tell residents about the local services available to them. Helping people to make better choices by taking up the opportunities available is really important – for example, anyone can sign up to a health trainer or join a quit smoking group."

Any organisations that do want to organise a health event can do so by calling 01604 651734 or emailing communications@northants.nhs.uk