Change4Life North West Update

Local areas across the North West are steadily embedding change4life across local activities and partnerships, using the change4life and related logos(e.g. bike4life, walk4life, cook4life) to co-brand initiatives and demonstrate their commitment to the campaign. The sub-regional radio campaigns in Cumbria, Lancashire and Greater Manchester have successfully promoted change4life key messages to large numbers of the population, and have also been the catalyst for further local activity.

Central Lancashire innovation
One particularly fun and innovative example is Central Lancashire NHS. All callers ringing their central switchboard who get put on hold hear the Lancashire versions of the change4life radio adverts (from the Lancashire radio campaign), and are reportedly being kept entertained as well as informed. If you would like further information about this imaginative communications scheme, please contact glenis.tansey@centrallancashire.nhs.uk

Liverpool to host change4life seminar
The Department of Health Change4Life team has contracted ContinYou, one of the UK's leading community learning organisations, to engage local supporters further in the Change4Life campaign through a seminar in each of the nine regions in England. The North West seminar will be hosted by NHS
Liverpool in early 2010 and will aim to attract a wide range of local supporters and local strategic representatives from the Liverpool area.

Annette James, obesity lead for NHS Liverpool said, "2010 is Liverpool's year of Health and Well Being - we want to build on the success of Liverpool's Challenge, we have almost reached our target of 'One million pounds' (weight) pledged from the adults in Liverpool. This seminar is a great opportunity to highlight our refocus on children, young people and families."

Points4life
NHS Manchester and Manchester City Council are working in partnership to deliver a new loyalty programme called points4life, which will encourage people to be eat well and be more active. The programme is funded by a grant of 4.6 million which was awarded through the Cross Government Obesity Unit’s Healthy Towns Initiative, with additional funding being committed by Manchester City Council and NHS Manchester to match this commitment. In the points4life programme, people throughout Manchester will earn loyalty points for making positive choices around healthy eating and exercise. Loyalty points will then be redeemable against a whole range of practical and aspirational incentives. The programme takes the knowledge and technology from the private sector and applies it to the public sector.

Points4life is designed to increase people’s motivation to take
responsibility for their health, improve the health of the people in the scheme, help tackle health inequalities by targeting services and health promotion to communities with greatest need and test whether it is feasible to apply a private sector loyalty model to healthcare. The programme is near the end of a lengthy, but essential, public procurement process in order to deliver the scheme, and it is anticipated that the programme will launch mid 2010.

For more information please contact Anthony Lawton on
anthony.lawton@manchester.nhs.uk or Steve Tilley on
Steve.Tilley@manchester.nhs.uk.