The Allied Health Professions (AHPs) strategy for England – AHPs deliver (21 June 2022)

Summary

Collectively, allied health professionals (AHPs) are the third largest clinical workforce in the NHS: there are 185,000 AHPs working in 14 professions across the spectrum of health and care, education, academia, research, the criminal justice system and the voluntary and private sectors.

This NHS England strategy is for the whole AHP community, including support workers, assistant practitioners, registered professionals, pre-registration apprentices and students. It aims to reflect how AHPs work in multidisciplinary teams, so that the AHP community working in a variety of health and care sectors can use it to continually improve and redesign services.

Content

The strategy outlines four foundations on which the AHP community should base practice:

1. AHPs champion diverse and inclusive leadership
2. AHPs in the right place, at the right time, with the right skills
3. AHPs research, innovate and evaluate
4. AHPs can further harness digital technology and innovate with data

It also describes five areas of focus for the AHP community:

1. People first
2. Optimising care
3. Social justice: addressing health and care inequalities
4. Environmental sustainability
5. Strengthening and promoting the AHP community