Innovation

Our approach to Innovation

By listening to our colleagues and partners, we identify gaps in our knowledge, look for solutions, find out if they would work in our context and then use the lessons we’ve learnt to shape how our urban health programmes work.

Throughout this process, we share our insights with organisations working on health inequalities and with other funders.

What we’re doing

Our work follows two broad themes:

1. Exploring how we can be a better funder
   This involves finding ways to engage and empower people and organisations to make decisions about how community health funding is allocated.
   It brings the voices of people from our boroughs into the heart of our research and strengthens the capacity of communities to support their residents. This approach to participatory research ensures that those most affected by health inequalities have a meaningful role in shaping the solutions.
2. Thinking about the future of urban health
   We are also exploring how urban places will look like in the future – and what challenges and opportunities will exist for us to help shape the health of people living in these places.

Within this, we’re thinking about how to build wealth within neighbourhoods in our boroughs, rebuild trust between communities that experience health inequalities and healthcare providers, and support opportunities for leaders from communities in our boroughs have a platform to advocate for themselves.

Across both themes, our goal is to develop approaches to health innovation and community health funding that can be shared with others working to reduce health inequalities. Find out more about our strategy and how it shapes our innovation work.