History of the JSNA

JSNA history and move towards a Southampton SNA

The Southampton JSNA and its evolution into a Single Needs Assessment (SNA) has happened over a number of years, informed by changing stakeholder needs and extensive consultation. A summary of this process is outlined below:

• The Joint Strategic Needs Assessment (JSNA) Refresh Consultation 2010 was produced in July 2010 to identify the needs and consult with stakeholders.

• Following a four month consultation period, a report of the consultation was produced at the end of 2010 based on responses from the public and stakeholder groups.

• Nine key JSNA themes for a healthier population were identified underpinned by the consultation findings, a good understanding of Southampton’s changing population and the Marmot 2010 main policy recommendations in a ‘Fair Society, Healthy Lives’.

• Development of an iterative online resource to host the JSNA; originally through the NHS Southampton PCT website and later the Southampton City Council Public Health Southampton website.

• A stakeholder workshop was held in June 2012 to help drive forward and improve the JSNA process in Southampton. Dr Angela Donkin from the UCL Institute of Health Equity gave an opening presentation to set the context of the JSNA. There was good engagement and many useful suggestions made at the workshop, many of which were implemented including the establishment of quarterly strategic and analysts groups.

• In 2013, public health responsibilities, including the development of the JSNA, moved to local government. At the same time, findings from an LGA Peer Review helped raise awareness and increase demand for public health style intelligence to drive evidence based decision making. This directly led to the creation of the Southampton City Council Strategy Unit in January 2015, followed by the Intelligence and Strategic Analysis team in October 2016, who took on responsibility for the JSNA and other statutory needs assessments in the city.

• Increasing demand for public health style analysis in other areas, such as community safety, economic development, demand modelling and the need for intelligence driven policies and strategies across the council and partners, led to the incorporation of these into the existing JSNA framework and the move towards a Single Needs Assessment for Southampton. This approach was endorsed by the Southampton Health and Wellbeing Board (HWB) and Southampton Safe City Partnership who are responsible for the statutory needs assessments in the city.

• A JSNA workshop held in November 2017 identified the strengths and limitations with the current JSNA / SNA. Limitations included a lack of clear strategic direction and a need to simplify the format to make it less complicated for users to find what was needed. As a result, a decision was taken to develop a new Southampton Data Observatory website to host a re-formatted SNA.