A LOCAL heart-health campaign has prevented more than 200 heart attacks and strokes so far, a meeting has heard.

Bradford has one of the country’s worst rates of heart disease and more than a quarter of all deaths are among under-75s.

The award-winning Bradford’s Healthy Hearts programme, an initiative led by Bradford Districts Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG), aims to cut the number of heart attacks and strokes by a tenth by 2020.

But the team may have to up its targets after making great strides since it began in 2015, the district’s Health and Wellbeing Board heard today.

The board was told that the programme employed shock tactics, including a hard-hitting poster featuring the outline of a body in a crime scene, labelling heart disease ‘Bradford’s biggest killer’, and letters to people deemed at risk which pulled no punches.

It aimed to tackle three main areas: cholesterol, high blood pressure and irregular heartbeats, by inviting at-risk people to take preventative drugs and make lifestyle changes.

After just over a year, it has saved the NHS an estimated £1.2m by preventing 211 strokes and heart attacks, Dr Youssef Beaini of the project said.

Helen Hirst, chief officer of Bradford City and Bradford Districts CCGs, said there had been “a lot of angst” about using shock tactics, but this showed it had been justified.

She said: “We sent out thousands and thousands of letters and we got four complaints.”

The board chairman, Bradford Council leader Councillor Susan Hinchcliffe, told the team: “Congratulations on saving the lives of 211 people. They will never know who they are, none of us will know who they are, but it is significant.”

The meeting also heard a presentation about Bradford Council’s new ‘home first’ approach to social care, aimed at keeping elderly and disabled people supported at home for as long as possible rather than in care homes.

Service users would also have the option of taking more control over their care budgets, the meeting heard.

Health bodies and patients’ groups expressed broad support for the idea, but said much would depend on how it was implemented.

Conservative spokesman for health and wellbeing, Councillor Jackie Whiteley, said: “I’m a little bit concerned when it comes to personal budgets, that people have got the money to manage themselves but will it reflect the true cost of care?”

She also said if they “rely too heavily on the voluntary sector” to support people, they may end up being lonely.

Bev Maybury, the Council’s strategic director for health and wellbeing, said: “I think there’s a risk, and I think whatever strategy we have, there’s a risk.

“I think if we carry on just providing care in a traditional way, it costs more than it needs to.

“I do think people get better value when they design their own services around things that are important to them.”