NHS job coaching 'changed my life'

Julie Wilson said the scheme had made her a "completely different person"

Specialist job coaches will be based in GP surgeries and hospitals as part of plans to get more people back into work.

About one in four people of working age in north-east England are economically inactive, with close to 40% suffering from ill health, according to latest figures.

The government will spend about £18m next year in the North East and north Cumbria as part of wider nationwide programme to place work coaches in healthcare facilities to help cut that figure.

Julie Wilson, from Norton, in Stockton-on-Tees, who took part, said: "I'm completely different to the person who walked into the room for the first meeting."

Sunderland GP Dr Martin Weatherhead said there was a real opportunity to get people the help they needed at an "earlier stage".

He said there were thousands of people in the area looking for work "but who have health problems stopping them".

However, he said people would not be put under pressure to return to work too soon.

"I think the danger is, if you make the service dependant on what a system wants and not what a patient needs," he said.

As long as interventions were based on improving how a person felt, making it easier for them to get back into work, "I don't see that as anything other than a positive", he said.

'Amazing journey'

The latest nationwide scheme builds on a pilot which has been running in Teesside and County Durham.

Ms Wilson said the coach worked with her "every step of the way and continued that support until I was ready to leave the service".

"There was a real focus on my wellbeing and what I needed as an individual," she said.

"To have something like this, supporting people through every phase of their journey is amazing."

Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) district manager Jackie McNab said the scheme was important for areas such as Derwent Tees Valley.

"We've always had higher levels of economic activity because of health," she said.