Throughout 2022 and starting up again in February 2023, Portobello Road Market has been hosting a health clinic ran by Neo Health based in North Kensington. We asked them to tell us a little about themselves and how they had found their experience running a stall on the market.

Image: A group including clinicians and medical students at a stall on Portobello Road Market

Neo Health Primary Care Network comprising of 6 GP practices based in North West London. We offer a variety of Primary Care services alongside our GP, HCA & Nurse services including:

· Mental Health Nurse

· Older Adults Mental Health Nurse

· Extended Hours

· Clinical Pharmacists

· First Contact Physiotherapist

· Social Prescribing

Our member practices:

· Colville Health Centre

· Exmoor Surgery

· Foreland Medical Centre

· Golborne Medical Centre – West 10 GPs

· Notting Hill Medical Centre

· St Quintin Health Centre

Through 2022, we have held monthly health check stalls at Portobello Market offering members of the public access to blood pressure checks, ECGs, provided health, lifestyle and mental health advice. We worked in partnership with other local organisations, such as OneYou, Community Living Well and Community Champions along with our PCN team (GPs, Health Care Assistants, Care Coordinators, Social Prescribing Link Workers) and medical students from Imperial College who volunteered to support. The initiative was part of Neo Health’s Hypertension programme which was co-lead by Dr Razak, a GP Partner and GP trainer at Golborne Medical Centre – West 10 GPs and Dr Chapman, a consultant in general and cardiovascular medicine and specialist in the management of hypertension.

We have had a very positive response from members of the public who reported that they valued being able to speak to health professionals and ask questions in a non-clinical setting, one patient also stated that ‘It saved me a trip to the GP!’. We also found that some members of the public had high blood pressure and weren’t aware of this, for example during our first stall we did 115 blood pressures, 37% of individuals had high blood pressure and 2/3rds of individuals with high blood pressure readings weren’t aware of this. One community member who presented to our stall was found to not only have a high blood pressure, but also Atrial Fibrillation. He was referred to his GP for further management. This demonstrates the importance of providing proactive health checks and providing information on how to reduce your risk of health conditions (i.e. cardiovascular disease).

Along with the more clinical focused aims of the stall, our PCN Social Prescribers worked together with local organisations to deliver health & lifestyle advice, health coaching and mental health support. We aim to break down barriers that exist for people to access health and wellbeing services through signposting to local services and informing patients of the support available to them.

We plan to carry out more stalls in the new financial year and will be looking at increasing the range of health issues as an opportunity to scale awareness and preventative activities.

To find out more about our Primary Care Network and member practices you can visit: https://www.neohealthpcn.nhs.uk/ and follow us on twitter @NeohealthPCN for regular updates.