Our key programmes
From NHS trusts to hospices and community-based healthcare organisations, Helpforce works with a diverse range of partners to create positive change. Explore our key programmes and see what we're achieving together.
Supporting Neighbourhood Health
Neighbourhood Health is a central pillar of the NHS 10-Year Health Plan. At its heart is a fundamental rebalancing of care delivery – moving away from a system that primarily responds to illness in hospitals, towards one that supports people to stay well in their communities.
Realising this vision will require strong partnerships and practical models that demonstrate how neighbourhood health systems can work on the ground. Helpforce is playing a leading role in developing this agenda – supporting, evaluating and sharing evidence from pioneering initiatives that bring services closer to home.
We have joined forces with PPL, the UK's leading social enterprise management consultancy, to spearhead a collaborative alliance that aims to shift neighbourhood health from aspiration into operational reality.
This partnership brings together our proven volunteering models and delivery capability with PPL's expertise in system design, commissioning and convening. Together, we bridge the gap between policy ambition and real-world implementation.
Working with ICSs to support up to 200,000 people
Building on our existing pioneering work with six Integrated Care Systems, Helpforce is developing major volunteering projects to generate learning across places: the ICS Back to Health programme.
Thanks to generous funding from The National Lottery Community Fund, we are working with geographically diverse organisations:
- North East & North Cumbria Integrated Care Board (ICB)
- Norfolk and Waveney ICB
- North West London ICB
- NHS Sussex ICB
- The Foundation Group (Midlands)
- Cornwall and Isles of Scilly ICB
By 2027, the programme will demonstrate how support from volunteers can measurably improve people’s experience of healthcare.
Key to achieving this will be improving the integration of the voluntary, community and social enterprise (VCSE) sector with NHS partners.
Volunteer to Career for Refugees
This programme, as part of our wider Volunteer to Career programme, helps healthcare organisations create volunteering pathways for medically qualified refugees to reconnect with their professions and gain familiarity with NHS systems.
Funded by the Rayne Foundation, it currently operates at Kingston and Richmond NHS Foundation Trust, Royal United Hospitals Bath NHS Foundation Trust, Liverpool Women's NHS Foundation Trust, Cheshire and Wirral Partnership NHS Foundation Trust, and Aneurin Bevan University Health Board.
Several other organisations offer complementary support, including preparation for medical exams, careers guidance and assistance with the costs of returning to practice.
Across these pathways, around 300 refugee healthcare professionals from countries including Ukraine, Afghanistan, Syria and Sudan have successfully transitioned into paid healthcare roles over the past three years, pointing to what could be achieved at much greater scale with sustained investment.
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