The NHS belongs to individuals.

It is there to improve our health and health and wellbeing, supporting us to keep mentally and physically well, to improve when we are ill and, when we can not fully recover, to stay as well as we can to the end of our lives. It operates at the limitations of science - bringing the greatest levels of human understanding and skill to save lives and enhance health. It touches our lives sometimes of fundamental human requirement, when care and empathy are what matter most.

The NHS is founded on a common set of concepts and worths that bind together the neighborhoods and people it serves - patients and public - and the personnel who work for it.

This Constitution establishes the concepts and values of the NHS in England. It sets out rights to which patients, public and personnel are entitled, and promises which the NHS is dedicated to achieve, together with duties, which the general public, clients and staff owe to one another to make sure that the NHS runs fairly and successfully. The Secretary of State for Health, all NHS bodies, private and voluntary sector suppliers providing NHS services, and regional authorities in the workout of their public health functions are needed by law to take account of this Constitution in their decisions and actions. References in this file to the NHS and NHS services consist of regional authority public health services, but references to NHS bodies do not include regional authorities. Where there are distinctions of information these are discussed in the Handbook to the Constitution.

The Constitution will be restored every ten years, with the participation of the general public, patients and staff. It is accompanied by the Handbook to the NHS Constitution, to be renewed at least every 3 years, setting out current assistance on the rights, promises, tasks and obligations developed by the Constitution. These requirements for renewal are lawfully binding. They guarantee that the concepts and values which underpin the NHS are subject to routine evaluation and re-commitment