The analysis by the NHS Confederation and Carnall Farrar, which highlights the significance of wider collaboration outside the NHS, with the local government and other partners, identified the top five intervention in terms of ROI.

Matthew Taylor, chief executive of the NHS Confederation, said: ‘It is clear that an initial investment in preventative schemes can pay back dividends for people's health and the economy.'

The top five interventions are:

• adapting 100,000 homes where a serious fall is otherwise likely to occur - £34.80
• training healthcare professionals, via clinical champions, to provide physical activity brief advice - £23.70
• Birmingham City Council's scheme to provide free leisure services to its residents – £20.70
• suicide/self-harm prevention (restrict access to means, making transport safer & reduce harmful drinking) - £19.60
• adapting 100,000 homes where residents are likely to require treatment due to the excess cold - £17.10.

The report recommends three key steps for national government, NHS England, integrated care systems and local partners:

• invest more in prevention, particularly where we know it has impact, for example children and young people
• take an evidence-based approach to commissioning services that considers ROI as part of holistic assessment
• use data to systematically evaluate and benchmark interventions, leveraging the longitudinal data available to the NHS and the investment in secure data environments and the federated data platform.

Cllr David Fothergill, chairman of the Local Government Association's Community Wellbeing Board, said: ‘Ahead of the Autumn Budget and Spending Review, we have called on government to invest in the public health grant and other vital areas of prevention, such as supported housing and health visiting. This must be part of a new long-term approach to funding prevention and early action support, and a more sophisticated understanding of the social return of that investment.

'Councils know how to maximize funding by partnering locally to create effective, preventative health services. With proper funding, prevention can become a core part of health and care and not a luxury extra when budgets allow.'