Elland Road Vaccination Centre closing in favour of a local model

Message from the NHS Leeds Clinical Commissioning group

As Leeds moves towards the next phase of the vaccine rollout, the vaccination programme board is making some changes to how and where vaccinations are offered in order to deliver the latest requirements of the programme.

Following a detailed options appraisal to consider how the vaccination programme can best be delivered in the future, we have decided to use a mixed model of delivery from community pharmacies, PCNs and a central ‘roving’ team that will offer vaccinations from a wide range of temporary clinics in local communities. This ‘roving’ model will replace the large-scale centre at Elland Road, building on the success of the pop-up services that we’ve been running throughout the current programme. The team will have a core base at Woodsley Health Centre, just outside the city centre but will operate clinics across the city.

Having listened to feedback from patients and local communities, we feel this approach will help us to meet the different needs of all our different cohorts as effectively as possible and ensure that vaccinations continue to be easy and convenient to access for people across the city. This new model will give us greater flexibility to target areas of lower uptake and adapt our services to meet the needs of different patient groups, such as 5-11 year olds. It will also enable us to deploy additional capacity at times of heightened demand, such as seasonal vaccination campaigns.

The centre at Elland Road has played a huge part in getting people across the city vaccinated as quickly as possible, delivering over 460,000 vaccinations. Now that there are not such high numbers of people needing vaccinating at the same time, we no longer need a centre on this scale but we have contingency plans so that we would still be able to vaccinate large numbers of people quickly if needed, such as in the event of another major outbreak.

We will be starting this new approach from the start of April so will be moving out of the centre at Elland Road at the end of the month, with the last vaccinations there taking place on 25 March. The team working there will become part of the new roving service offering vaccinations across the city. Appointments will continue to be available to book via the National Booking System as well as being offered on a walk-in basis.

Many of you have been involved in supporting the vaccination programme over the past year, whether at Elland Road or at one of the many PCN, pharmacy or community clinics. None of what we’ve achieved so far with the vaccination programme would have been possible without the combined efforts of #TeamLeeds, so huge thanks to everyone who has been involved in any capacity and for your continued support.

 

NHS Leeds CCG