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Core20PLUS5 Adults in Greater Manchester

Core20PLUS5 Adults Approach in Greater Manchester

The Core20PLUS5 adults approach in Greater Manchester aims to reduce health inequalities and improve outcomes for the most disadvantaged communities. Read about the great work happening across Greater Manchester and to find links to our plans, strategies and other useful websites.

Maternity

The Greater Manchester Screening and Immunisation Team and the Greater Manchester and Eastern Cheshire Local Maternity and Neonatal System are working to improve access to maternity care and antenatal screening through early antenatal booking. The ‘As Soon As You’re Pregnant’ (ASAP) early booking campaign has launched a new website to encourage and signpost women to book for maternity care by 10 weeks of pregnancy. 

The Local Maternity and Neonatal System are also working with the voluntary sector to engage with communities and scope maternity services for LBGTQ+ groups and people with disabilities, as part of the local maternity and neonatal system equity and equality action plan and the NHS England 3 year delivery Plan for maternity and neonatal services.   

For further maternity information and updates see the Local Maternity and Neonatal System website page.  

Severe Mental Illness

GP writing notes and taking a patient's blood pressure.

Providing support for those experiencing severe mental illness is part of Core20PLUS5 and Greater Manchester continues to lead the way in improving physical health outcomes for people with Severe Mental Illness (SMI).  For 24/25 the region achieved a 70% completion rate for SMI Physical Health Checks with 19,075 out of 27,215 individuals on the GP SMI register, surpassing the national target of 60%. Notably, all localities exceeded the national benchmark, reflecting strong collaboration across Primary Care Networks, Secondary Care, Voluntary, Community and Social Enterprise partners and system leaders. 

Current focus is on sustaining local delivery with continued support for Primary Care Networks and partners to maintain above-target performance and address persistent inequalities in access to physical health checks.  Monitoring and Evaluation of current initiatives is also a focus to understand impact and to inform future commissioning decisions. 

NHS Greater Manchester are working to support Primary Care Networks and voluntary community social enterprise partners to address inequalities of access for people with severe mental illness.

To read the 5 year Greater Manchester Mental Health and Wellbeing strategy which sets out what as a city-region is being done to better support those with mental ill health see ‘Doing Mental Health Differently’ Mental Health and Wellbeing Strategy 2024 - 2029  

To find out more about mental health and wellbeing support and services available see link: Get to know where to go for mental health support

Early Cancer Diagnosis 

Photo of a yellow van parked outside a warehouse. On the van is the text "This Van Can" with a photo of an older black male, the NHS logo and the text "Help you find out more about the cancer that affects 1 in 4 black men".

Improving rates of early cancer diagnosis is part of the CORE20PLUS5 focus and is important in relation to providing access to early treatment and support. Finding cancer early often means it is easier to treat and can improve the outcomes. The Greater Manchester Cancer Alliance has been shortlisted for two awards at the HSJ 2025 Awards recognising innovation in early diagnosis and cancer diagnostics.  

The Greater Manchester Early Cancer Diagnosis Strategy has been approved and the focus in the coming months will be a continuation of delivering #ThisVanCan mobile community outreach initiative with projects targeting areas with higher rates of late-stage diagnoses for ovarian, colorectal and oesophageal cancers. 

There will also be further cancer awareness sessions taking place for both professionals and community members in localities, supporting them to have more effective cancer-related conversations. 

The Cancer Alliance Cancer Academy and Gateway C continue to be the source of cancer education for primary care in Greater Manchester.

Early Cancer Screening

Cervical screening 

NHS England Screening and Immunisation Team in Greater Manchester are supporting Answer Cancer (AC) to raise awareness of the cervical screening programme within targeted communities to improve uptake and address health inequalities. 

Bowel screening 

The Screening and Immunisation team are working with bowel cancer screening providers to increase the number of people who have a positive screen to go on to complete diagnostic testing.  

Cancer Service Improvement Leads are also working to identify patients eligible for bowel cancer screening who may need adjustments to support them with completing the initial screening tests and any further steps on the pathway if required.  

Innovative Projects 

As part of work within cancer screening there is a programme of supporting those with learning disabilities to help inform and provide additional support to increase the numbers that go on to have screening. The model piloted will now be extended to provide support for those with other disabilities including severe mental illness, physical disability, sight and hearing loss. The model is planned to be replicated across the NHS Breast Screening Programme. By providing proactive support to take part in screening, this will reduce health inequalities experienced by those with disabilities, improve the uptake of screening and improve health.  In addition, a pathway and resources have been developed for a person with learning disabilities to access cervical screening. 

There is a designated Greater Manchester Screening and Immunisation Futures NHS page which contains useful resources and information for health care professionals.

Hypertension and Lipid Management/Cardiovascular Disease

Simple drawing of person leaping into the air wearing blue trousers and a yellow jumper with a red heart on the chest.

The HEARTbeat GM project has provided targeted support to 13 practices across Greater Manchester with the greatest need (as defined by uncontrolled hypertension), The project was successful with measurable improvements across the majority of practices that took part. 

Community Engagements pilots have taken place to support cardiovascular disease prevention within the Black Caribbean community in Manchester and the South Asian community in Rochdale with long standing changes as a result of the project.  

The pilot in Manchester saw 1123 attendees, referred 450 for preventative support, carried out 207 blood pressure checks. A Caribbean cookbook was also co-created to provide recipes with healthier alternatives. 

​The Rochdale pilot included 1144 conversations being undertaken about cholesterol and blood pressure. 530 blood pressure checks were carried out. A culturally relevant booklet was co-designed with community influencers providing information on cholesterol and using culturally relevant references and pictures. 

Please see further link to the Rochdale learning: Rochdale spotlight: Engaging with our underserved communities to improve cardiovascular health - Health Innovation Manchester 

To learn more about cardiovascular disease in Greater Manchester see the Manchester academic Health Science Centre- MAHSC Seminar Series: Understanding and treating cardiovascular disease in Greater Manchester - Health Innovation Manchester  

Chronic Respiratory Disease Prevention 

A woman wearing a headscarf, black flowery dress and blue medical gloves is stood next to an older man in a wheelchair wearing a grey jumper and holding a face mask. Both are smiling at the camera.

As part of Core20PLUS5 there is a clear focus on prevention of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) driving up uptake of Adult vaccinations to reduce infective exacerbations and emergency hospital admissions due to those exacerbations. 

Winter Vaccinations (Section 7A)  

NHS Greater Manchester are continuing work with voluntary community social enterprises to deliver improved uptake initiatives within underserved communities. So far Access & Inequalities funding enabled impactful initiatives such as:

  • Mobile vaccination vans across all 10 localities to support underserved communities to access vaccinations,  

  • Outreach in faith settings and foodbanks.  

  • Vaccinations pilot being offered at a respiratory ward for at risk patients

NHS Greater Manchester have also created accessible resources for inclusion (e.g. addressing language barriers and taking into account reading ages, etc). These efforts have improved access to vaccinations and improved trust in underserved communities. 

Resources are available online at: Keep Protected WinterVax 2025