Perhaps we should no longer be surprised by the quality of debate on the state of the NHS. But the recent argy-bargy over whether the service now has more managers than beds remains deeply depressing. As fewer than three in 100 patients are treated in a hospital bed, the manager/bed ratio is devoid of meaning.

In the real world, meanwhile, many of the most innovative advances in healthcare are taking place in the community. This special supplement to Society Guardian aims to showcase some of the work being done, largely unheralded, to realise the goal of an NHS that is "closer to home".

We take a look at a new kind of worker whose role is to help people living with a mental illness to help themselves. Elsewhere, we ask health minister Rosie Winterton if the government is prepared to rethink its controversial draft mental health bill to avoid such people being swept up in a wave of compulsory treatment.

The most effective solutions are disarmingly simple. We look at some remarkable results in reducing falls among older people and at how a community-based approach is improving nutrition. We also show how ethnic minority groups are seeking medical advice thanks to the work of a local pharmacist.

We go north of the border to find out how Scotland is blazing its own community health trail, and then return south for some comments both in defence of English primary care trusts and in despair at the volume of regulation and inspection they face.

We hope you agree that the NHS is about much more than hospitals. And we hope the government gets the message, too. When Tony Blair addressed the Guardian public services summit a fortnight ago, his chosen indicators of progress in healthcare were more nurses, doctors and hospitals, lower waiting lists and - in what seemed an afterthought - fewer deaths from heart disease. When the latter heads the politicians' lists, we'll be getting somewhere. david.brindle@theguardian.com