Community Health Services: Allied Health Professions

Integrated care boards (ICBs) plan, commission, and oversee the provision of local National Health Services, including community health services, to meet their population’s needs.

The Government is committed to training the staff we need to ensure patients are cared for by the right professional, when and where they need it. We will publish a 10 Year Workforce Plan to set out action to create a workforce ready to deliver the transformed services set out in the 10-Year Health Plan.

We know people are waiting too long for community health services. That is why, for the first time, we have set a clear target for systems to work to reduce long waits in NHS England’s Medium-Term Planning Framework.

By 2028/29 at least 80% of community health services activity should take place within 18 weeks, bringing community health services in line with targets for elective care.

In 2025, we published, for the first time, an overview of the core community health services, Standardising Community Health Services, that ICBs should consider when planning for their local populations to support improved commissioning and delivery of community health services, a vital part of Neighbourhood Health. Further guidance was published in February 2026, providing more detailed descriptions of the core components of community health services for ICBs.