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Patient Need Groups 

Health and social care providers are asked to jointly plan neighbourhood health for the local populations with an initial focus on people with the most complex health and care needs. 

To help clinicians tailor care for people, especially those with the greatest need, people in Kent and Medway will start to be segmented using the Johns Hopkins tool. This puts people into Patient Needs Groups (PNGs).

If you use the NHS App, you may have already seen your PNG.

How do PNGs work?  

  • Everyone is different. Some people are very healthy, some have one or two health problems, and some have many health problems.  
  • The PNG system puts people into 11 different groups based on how much care and support they are likely to need.  
  • Your group can change if your health changes.  

Watch a video about Patient Need Groups and neighbourhood teams

Patient Need Groups (PNGs)

The Patient Need Groups (PNGs) help us understand how much care and support each patient is likely to need, based on their health conditions, how often they use healthcare, and how complex their needs are.

There are 11 groups in total, ranging from healthy people to those with very complex or serious health needs:

  1. Non-Users
  2. Low-Need Child
  3. Low-Need Adult
  4. Low Complexity Morbidity
  5. Medium Complexity Morbidity
  6. Pregnancy Low Complexity
  7. Pregnancy High Complexity
  8. Dominant Psychiatric Condition
  9. Dominant Major Chronic Condition
  10. Multi-Morbidity High Complexity
  11. Frailty

Knowing these groups helps explain why different patients might need different types or levels of care.

In order to help us tailor care according to individual patient need, we now have access to a tool that categorises our population into these 11 groups.

Find out more here.

Low need

  1. 1Non-user
  2. 2Low need Child
  3. 3Low need Adult
  4. 4Low Complexity Morbidity

Medium need

  1. 5Medium Complexity Morbidity
  2. 6Pregnancy Low Complexity
  3. 7Pregnancy High Complexity
  4. 8Dominant Psychiatric Condition
  5. 9Dominant Major Chronic Condition

High need

  1. 10Multi-Morbidity High Complexity
  2. 11Frailty