Acute Trusts
The London Pathway transforms the quality of healthcare received by homeless people admitted to an acute hospital. A small London Pathway team works across the hospital, visiting all homeless patients, and working with ward staff and other clinicians to care for them. The London Pathway team provides expert support and advice to clinical colleagues on how to treat patients with multiple morbidities (especially alcohol and drugs issues, and mental health problems), and engages with the patients directly, helping them participate more fully in decision making about their care, and bringing focused but sensitive attention to planning for their discharge and after.
London Pathway needs assessment
Before establishing a London Pathway service in a hospital we recommend that a Needs Assessment exercise takes place. A London Pathway needs assessment consists of a structured review of patient data about homeless people, to understand the numbers and types of homeless patients being admitted and start to identify where particular problems or issues arise with their care. Alongside the review of data, the London Pathway team work with local medical staff, hospital management, primary care and statutory and voluntary sector community based services to map the relevant services around the hospital. A needs assessment exercise concludes with a detailed local plan, setting out how a tailored local London Pathway service could best be established and including a practical implementation plan.
London Pathway service development
Following a needs assessment, London Pathway staff will work with local staff to recruit, train and launch a local London Pathway service.
Work in progress
London Pathway needs assessments are under way at Barts and the London NHS Trust and at Brighton and Sussex University Hospital NHS Trust. We are also in discussion with a number of other hospital trusts.
The Pathway needs assessment for the Royal London Hospital has now been published and is available here .
A consultation draft of the needs assessment for Brighton and Sussex University Hospital Trust is available here . This document was distributed at a seminar held in the hospital on 17th November. Colleagues from Brighton are invited to submit comments on this version before the end of November 2011 to We will publish a final version of the document here early in December 2012.
If you would like more information about setting up a London Pathway service in your hospital, or if you would like to find out about any work we may have taking place in your area, please email us at