The West of England AHSN held a meeting recently, marking the first steps towards building a valuable partnership with the regional voluntary and community sectors.
The aim was to build relationships with organisations that could help us effectively engage with the most vulnerable groups in society, those who are isolated, housebound, the frail and elderly. Organisations that attended were Age UK, LinkAge, the Red Cross and West of England Care and Repair.
Two of our workstreams found the meeting particularly useful in terms of informing and supporting future areas of work.
Our Enterprise team is keen to make sure they are reaching people who might want to get involved in the next phase of our Design Together, Live Better project. This is providing the opportunity for people living with long-term health conditions, carers, family, friends and anyone else interested in healthcare, to suggest or give feedback on product ideas that might improve quality of life and independence. Last year, the first phase of the project developed three product prototypes, based on the experiences of people that attended a series of workshops and crowd-sourcing activities across the region. This next phase is looking to widen and increase our reach, and so voluntary and community organisations, through their membership and users, are extremely well placed to help us do that.
For some time, our Patient Safety Collaborative has been aware that its focus has been on acute care. With an increasing emphasis on healthcare in the community, it is important for us to influence those who have a role to play in safety in the home. Organisations like the Red Cross and Care & Repair often go into people’s homes and provide support to vulnerable people who might be just under the radar of health professionals. The role of staff in these organisations could be vital in improving patient safety and preventing avoidable Emergency Department admissions.
By the end of the meeting, there was great excitement about the potential for working together. A start was been made at the recent ‘Wisdom of the Crowd’ event to launch phase two of Design Together, Live Better, attended by several voluntary and community sector organisations. The Patient Safety team is also planning to offer SBAR (Situation, Background, Assessment, Recommendation ) training to several of the organisations.
Posted on May 9, 2016
