ABSTRACT
This chapter presents a community development, Community Action on Health, that has built partnerships between primary care organisations and local communities in Newcastle upon Tyne. It describes a community development approach to building a partnership between a primary care trust and the local communities it serves. However, policy also commits the NHS to a more consumerist style despite attempting democratic accountability through Overview and Scrutiny Committees', and encouraging wider involvement through 'local networks'. The emergence of Primary Care Groups (PCGs) in April 1999 enabled groups of general practitioners practices and staff working together to develop services in geographical areas rather than focus exclusively on their own practice patients. Newcastle West PCG, where the Community Action on Health project started in 1995, covered a population of 114000, including a significant black and ethnic minority population. The Community Action on Health project has used a community development approach to realise community participation in health issues.
