⚡ Powering Up the Future of Health

Big vision. Bold action. Real results.

In under a year, Powering Up has gone from idea to national recognition—proving that when young people and clinicians co-create, real change sparks fast.
This isn’t business as usual. It’s a new kind of movement—alive with colour, courage, and creativity.

Our Results

In under a year, Powering Up has gone from idea to national recognition—proving that when young people and clinicians co-create, real change sparks fast.This isn’t business as usual. It’s a new kind of movement—alive with colour, courage, and creativity.

  • delivered both arms of our pilot in two different cities
  • engaged more than 100 YP from the UK’s most deprived boroughs
  • co-produced: project branding, tote bags, social media and media assets, an evolving research agenda
  • increased clinician confidence in connecting social determinants to clinical presentations after learning first-hand about community needs, e.g. hardship in local schools
  • engaged and presented early findings to health leaders in each city producing change in local care pathways
  • begun to build connections across local primary care networks and secondary and tertiary child health services

Lightning Bolts

  • Powering Up has energised YP and clinicians across the country. 
  • Powering Up gives ordinary people the power and the skills to be in the driving seat of their own lives while helping to bring others along with them. Powering Up is empowering YP and clinicians to become enablers and to support others which will ultimately decrease feelings of stuckness and reduce pressure on services
  • We want to take this to the next level and believe that these ‘Lightning Bolts' can not only champion the project but also provide peer support to other YP and clinicians to spark widespread, sustainable change.  

Spreading The Word

  • Our work has managed to get and hold the attention of an entire generation of paediatricians. We have published in three successive issues of Milestones, the RCPCH magazine while becoming THE standout project at the college national conference. Powering Up is thus setting the standard for youth co-production across the profession.
  • In short, Powering Up has been welcomed with open arms, and people want more!
  • Publications
    • BMJ articles x 2 (in press)
    • Milestones articles x 3
    • Podcasts
      • Whose Shoes
      • Health Foundation
    • National Presentations
      • Q Annual Event

🎉 What We’ve Achieved (so far)

In just six months, we’ve:

  • Ran two pilot programmes across Birmingham & London
  • Engaged 100+ young people from the UK’s most deprived boroughs
  • Co-produced everything—from tote bags to training tools, research agendas to Instagram reels
  • Boosted clinician confidence in tackling social determinants head-on
  • Presented findings to health leaders, shaping real care pathways
  • Started building bridges across primary, secondary, and community health systems

And we’re just getting started.

🌟 Finalists at the Health Service Journal Awards

Incredible but true: we were shortlisted for Best Pilot of the Year—just six months after forming. A testament to the energy, originality, and impact of what we’ve built together.

🧠 Our Work Is Being Published

We’re turning insight into influence:

  • 2 articles published with the BMJ,  with at least 2 more peer-review articles on the way
  • 3 features in Milestones (and counting) the RCPCH magazine
  • Appearances on leading podcasts like Whose Shoes and The Health Foundation
  • Invited speakers at national conferences, including the Health Foundation Q Community’s Annual Event

Powering Up is setting the benchmark for youth co-production in UK healthcare.

⚡ Meet the Lightning Bolts

Young people and clinicians who’ve been through Powering Up don’t just walk away inspired—they become Lightning Bolts.
These are everyday changemakers, ready to lead, support peers, and spark system-wide transformation.
Our vision? A growing network of Lightning Bolts across the country—bringing knowledge, empathy and lived experience into every corner of care.

🌈 Help Us Go Further

We’ve built something powerful on passion, community and creativity. But to grow? We need fuel.

  • Train more Lightning Bolts
  • Expand into new regions
  • Embed creative co-production in health systems that need it most

Invest in Powering Up.

 Let’s build a future where healthcare works with people—not just for them.

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Meet the Lightning Bolts

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