Positive report for East Renfrewshire Health and Social Care Partnership

The strategic planning of health and social care services in the East Renfrewshire Health and Social Care Partnership (HSCP) has received a positive report from inspectors.

The report, carried out by a team of inspectors from Healthcare Improvement Scotland and the Care Inspectorate between April and June 2019, evaluated three quality indicators as ‘good’.

These were:

the partnership’s performance;

strategic planning and commissioning;

leadership and direction.

Inspectors reported “There was clear evidence that the partnership was improving its health and social services for adults.

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“It had a culture of collaborative leadership, sound governance and a strong commitment to integration.

“The partnership’s default approach for all its activities was integrated working. It had made commendable progress with technology-enabled care, whereby people were supported by communication technology to keep well and maintain their independence.

“It worked positively with its third sector partners to develop some innovative person-centred services that used community assets to deliver improved health and wellbeing outcomes for people who used services and unpaid carers. The partnership needed to do more to engage productively with the independent sector.”

The leadership of the HSCP through the Integration Joint Board was also recognised in the report, describing it as “well-established” and “settled”.

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Inspectors have stated: “The Integration Joint Board provided effective leadership for integrated and collaborative working across the partnership and the delivery of positive outcomes for all people who used health and social care services for adults and unpaid carers.

“the Integration Joint Board was a strong role model for integrated, collaborative working and commitment to the delivery of the best possible outcomes for East Renfrewshire residents.”

The report also identifies five areas for further development including planning; meaningfully involving stakeholders; and ensuring effective operational leadership and management capacity to fully implement strategies and plans.

A spokesman for East Renfrewshire Health and Social Care Partnership, said: “We are pleased with the findings of this report. A huge amount of work has gone into our strategic planning and we are starting to see the results of this in the delivery of our services. For example, inspectors found our post-diagnostic support for patients with dementia to be effective as a direct result of our planning.

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“We will be prioritising the five areas of improvement identified and will continue to strive to provide the residents of East Renfrewshire the best health and social care possible.

The report noted that the HSCP’s strategic planning resulted in a number of positive outcomes for residents including:

∙In May 2019, only two East Renfrewshire patients had their discharge from hospital delayed. This was the lowest number of delays for any of the Scottish mainland partnerships.

∙ The partnership worked well with care homes. This work had contributed to a reduction in residents’ unplanned admissions to hospital with a 23% reduction in emergency hospital admissions from care homes in 2018-19 compared to 2017-18. There was also a 21% reduction in accident and emergency unit attendances from care homes, over the same period.

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∙ The number of people in the partnership who used a community alarm, or other telecare service, was higher than the Scotland average. The use of telehealth was positive, with 100% of GP practices signed up to remote blood pressure monitoring, saving 1355 face-to-face GP appointments.

∙ Across Scotland, around 30% of GP practices were signed up to remote monitoring of patients with high blood pressure. The partnership successfully used technology to improve the care and management of people with this long-term condition.

∙ The partnership cooperated with the third sector to develop several valuable initiatives. . It made good progress in building community capacity and resilience and deliver this through co-production approaches.

∙ The partnership and its third sector partners developed a range of service options that used community assets. These services focused on prevention and early intervention. For example, community link workers, linked to GP practices, gave people with psychological wellbeing issues useful information and signposted them to appropriate community supports. This increased social prescribing that helped to reduce demand for statutory services and reliance on pharmacological treatments.