Reality check: next steps in developing sustainability and transformation plans

The NHS planning guidance set out the notion of sustainability and transformation plans (STPs) in 2015. The plans aimed to bring together local leaders in health, local government and patient representation to plan how services would become sustainable between 2016 and 2021. 

The STPs would facilitate health service providers and local authorities working together to ensure that services are delivered across the whole of the local health and care economy and not lead by any particular organisation’s priorities. Forty four local areas were established and initial plans were to be submitted in February 2017. 

The 44 STPs which form the basis for NHS planning in the coming years, and explicitly link it to social care, are all now public in their draft forms. What conditions are likely to be critical to success, and do the STPs suggest that those conditions are in place? 

This Insight analyses the 44 STPs for the answer.