Integrated care connections
- Published: 08 September 2008 09:00
- Author: Paul Dinsdale
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- Last Updated: 05 September 2008 16:31
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The Connected Care project involves healthcare organisations genuinely listening to local people. Paul Dinsdale tunes in
Despite all the government rhetoric about integrated care, the reality still seems some way off. But one initiative taking shape in various parts of the country could see it move a step closer.
As NHS North West chief executive Mike Farrar says, "no politician is going to stand up and say we don't want integrated care, but the problem in the past has been matching the rhetoric to the action".
But at a conference in London this year the charity Turning Point brought together professionals from health, social care and housing sectors to discuss how the needs of vulnerable groups could be better addressed through closer working between these public services.
"This project offered something beyond the medical model and a broad group of stakeholders were willing to come together to deliver services"
The charity's Connected Care project is based on research which shows that involving the community from the outset in planning services is a much more efficient way of determining health needs. By setting up a centre of excellence in Connected Care, Turning Point has focused attention on the need for different services to take into account local people's views.
"We have managed to get commitments from the director of health and social care in the areas we are working in [so far Hartlepool and Bolton] that we have a common set of values for commissioning health and social care services," says centre of excellence director Richard Kramer.
"When a primary care trust has a public consultation on changes to services, it has usually already decided what it is going to do. In the Connected Care approach, we talk to existing organisations that represent vulnerable groups in the community about what local people's needs are and carry out an audit of current services.
"Many groups have multiple needs - for example, people with learning disabilities are also users of mental health services, so services have to respond to those needs rather than seeing them as separate 'packages' of care. The community audit begins with the community and puts them at the centre of care commissioning.
"It enables the community to design and deliver their own services, and engages groups who are rarely consulted."
Hard to reach
Hartlepool appears to show it can be done, as the PCT has begun to change services it commissions as a result of the audit.
Mr Kramer says Turning Point has worked with the audit teams made up of local people to provide training in research methods, specifically working with hard to reach groups such as mental health services users. The training is also supported by the Social Care Institute for Excellence.
"We can provide the resources to ensure whether the Connected Care audit has effectively engaged the community, whether the services work for individuals, communities and commissioners and whether the framework has been adapted to reflect the different priorities of local areas," says Mr Kramer.
The charity has also developed a cost-benefit model which tests the impact of Connected Care on the provision of health and social care services.
Hartlepool and Stockton on Tees PCT joint director of health systems and estate development Alison Wilson says the PCTs recognised the opportunity to work in a new way with the local community.
"There are long-standing health and social care problems, significant deprivation and limited access to medical services in the area. This project offered something beyond the medical model and a broad group of stakeholders were willing to come together to deliver services in a different way.
"It's too soon to demonstrate major changes in outcomes, but we've appointed Connected Care workers who support individuals to access services more effectively and act as advocates."
Turning Point is now working with local people in Bolton to produce an audit of local health and social care services and has the agreement of local NHS, social services and housing managers to make changes in commissioning where needed.
