HEALTH professionals must have a stronger influence over the way Health and Social Services resources are allocated, says public health director Stephen Bridgman.

Decisions on spending within Health and Social Services are currently made by politicians who receive clinical advice from professionals in the field.

Despite the inclusion of other lay members on the board, the politicians are the only ones with voting rights.

In his first report, Dr Bridgman (pictured) has recommended a revised subcommittee, called the Professional Executive Committee, be created to coordinate advice to the Health board on professional issues and priorities.

It would include professional members working in primary and secondary care.

‘A PEC would be in a good position to coordinate service redesign and look at existing clinical pathways, identify relatively lower priority elements that may be omitted with little health impact and the saving of resources,’ he said.

This would make the current Medical Advisory Committee comparable to a similar UK body.

Dr Bridgman said that UK bodies had developed professional leads to take responsibility for clinical governance and advise on relative priorities for service investment.

‘There is a need for greater clinical involvement in resource allocation in Guernsey. Currently decisions across the States are not made with an explicit priority-setting framework,’ he said.