The Heatwave Plan for England 2008 is published today on a day of blazing sunshine, so that should put paid to a summer in the UK. Its purpose is to enhance resilience in the event of a heatwave. It is an important component of overall emergency planning; and will become increasingly relevant in adapting to the impact of climate change.

Related documents:

Advice for health and social care professionals offers advice for individuals, or teams, engaged in primary care or social services, or for home care providers both on caring for people most at risk during a heatwave, and on organising others who provide care.

Heatwave: supporting vulnerable people before and during a heatwave - advice for care home managers and staff where people are especially at risk during a heatwave. The effects of heat occur rapidly, and to be effective, preparatory action has to be taken before the beginning of June. This factsheet details necessary preparations.

Heatwave: a guide to looking after yourself and others during hot weather providing useful information and advice on the hazards of a heatwave, how to recognise the symptoms of heat exhaustion and heat stroke, and how to deal with the effects of too much heat.

The Common core principles to support self care have been developed by Skills for Health and Skills for Care with key stakeholders, including service users and carers, to develop a set of common core principles to support self care. The principles capture best practice in order to enable service reform and encourage choice, control, independence and participation of those using health and social services.

A consultation on the framework for the registration of health and adult social care providers follows on from the previous consultation on the future regulation of health and adult social care (November 2006), and the response to that consultation, which was published in October 2007. It seeks views on: which health and adult social care services should require registration with the Care Quality Commission; and what the requirements for registration should be. It also seeks views on when providers of regulated services should be required to have a registered manager, and how primary care services should be included in the new registration system.

A partial Impact Assessment of the Scope of Registration of Primary Medical and Dental Care has been completed as part of this consultation.

The Cabinet Office have produced Volunteering in the Public Services: Health and Social Care which is the first in a series examining the role of volunteers and volunteering in public services. Through consultation with over 1000 volunteers and organisations it found much potential to expand volunteering in health and social care to build more people centred services. It identifies a largely untapped source of volunteers in service-users. It argues that they could make an enormous contribution as volunteers in health and social care because no one understands what it is like to have a condition like a person who has it themselves.

The main recommendations are:

• In-house ‘volunteering hubs’ should be established within government agencies to help mainstream volunteering in health and social care services.

• When commissioning services, Government agencies should consider the social benefits and true costs of volunteering.

• Employee volunteering schemes should become commonplace throughout health and social care services.

• A programme board should be set up, with a remit to increase volunteering in health and social care and ensure that volunteers are properly managed.

• Both the Government and charities need to make more of the huge, largely untapped, resource of service-users as volunteers.

• NHS websites should signpost their users to peer group support websites, and to more general volunteering opportunities.

Children on bullying report summarises research on children’s views on bullying, defining what bullying is and what to do about it. There are both worrying messages and hopeful signs among the varied responses.

It covers children living away from home in England (in children’s homes, boarding schools, residential special schools, residential further education colleges, foster care, adoption placements or residential family centres), those who are getting help of any sort from the children’s social care services of their local council and care leavers.

Established to contribute to the national debate about the future shape of social care to meet  the major demographic changes, higher expectations of quality support amongst carers and the strong focus on self-directed care and independent living.  The Standing Commission on Carers will seek new solutions to old problems. It aims to put carers at the heart of policy-making as equal partners in exploring new ways of maximising independence and developing high quality (and cost-effective) services fit for the 2lst century.

Currently their site details membership and terms of reference.

Lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans (LGBT) people experience a number of health inequalities which are often unrecognised in health and social care settings. These briefings are intended to show that LGBT people can be younger, older, bisexual, lesbians, gay men, trans, from black and minority ethnic (BME) communities and disabled, and to dispel assumptions that they form a homogeneous group.

The briefings provide easy-to-read guidance for health and social care commissioners, service planners and frontline staff. They aim to inform the delivery of appropriate services and to support health and social care professionals in their everyday work with LGBT people by providing fundamental awareness and evidence of LGBT needs in relation to health.

• Introduction
• Briefing 1: Working with lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans (LGBT) people
• Briefing 2: Improving access to health and social care for lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans (LGBT) people
• Briefing 3: Young lesbian, gay and bisexual (LGB) people
• Briefing 4: Older lesbian, gay and bisexual (LGB) people
• Briefing 5: Lesbian health
• Briefing 6: Gay men’s health
• Briefing 7: Bisexual people’s health
• Briefing 8: Healthy lifestyles for lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans (LGBT) people
• Briefing 9: Mental health issues within lesbian, gay and bisexual (LGB) communities
• Briefing 10: Sexual health
• Briefing 11: Trans people’s health
• Briefing 12: Lesbian, gay and bisexual (LGB) people from Black and minority ethnic communities
• Briefing 13: Disabled lesbian, gay and bisexual (LGB) people

A brief shout out to Sue over at Lancashire Care who noticed this.

The Commissioning framework for health and well-being sets out the eight steps that health and social care should take in partnership to commission more effectively. It is squarely aimed at commissioners and providers of services in health, social care and local authorities.  Recently issued are the ministerial statement and summary of responses to consultation on the framework.

Informal and private care is plugging a funding gap of £25k for every disabled person over the age of 65 in Britain today says A Charter for Change, a new report from the charity Counsel and Care. Coming ahead of a Green Paper on Social Care, it calls for 2008 to be ‘the year of the care debate’ and urges Government to adopt a radical new framework for the future of social care.

Putting people first is a ministerial concordat expressing the Government’s shared ambition is to put people first through a radical reform of public services, enabling people to live their own lives as they wish, confident that services are of high quality, are safe and promote their own individual needs for independence, well-being and dignity. It promises to invest £500 million in social care services, and give people more control over the care they receive.  The concordat establishes the collaboration between central and local government, the sector’s professional leadership, providers and the regulator, setting shared aims and values which will guide the transformation of adult social care, and recognises that the sector will work across shared agendas with users and carers to transform people’s experience of local support and services.

Crisis Resolution Home Treatment teams are having a positive impact on local acute mental health services, providing an alternative to hospital admission for people experiencing a short-term mental health crisis.

But Helping people through mental health crisis: The role of Crisis Resolution and Home Treatment services (Executive Summary, Crisis Resolution Home Treatment Services: Report from a Survey of Referring Clinicians) from the National Audit Office found that services are being limited by a lack of input from specialist health and social care professionals, variations in staffing levels across the country and too few admissions to hospital being assessed by CRHT teams. These teams have been implemented across most areas of the country, there are wide variations between areas in the extent to which teams are staffed and resourced but where they are working they are making a significant impact. CRHT teams have reduced pressure on beds and the teams have been successful in reaching many service users who would otherwise have needed admission to hospital. CRHT teams are also supporting people in early discharge from hospital.

Only three regions achieved the Department’s estimate for a full functioning service of 14 or more whole-time-equivalent CRHT staff per 150,000 population. Staffing in the least well resourced region (North West) is 25 per cent lower than that in the best (South Central) and the national headcount for staff is only 90 per cent of the number estimated by the Department as required.

The report concludes that there is still more to do. To maximize the impact of CRHT and improve value for money the Department and the NHS need to ensure that CRHT teams are properly resourced, fully functional and integrated within local mental health services. National data on services must improve, and better use of feedback and data made at the local level. Local NHS organizations need to improve links between CRHT teams and other mental health services, and Mental Health Trusts should enforce written policies and procedures requiring every inpatient admission to be preceded by a CRHT assessment.

Pandemic influenza: guidance for infection control in hospitals and primary care settings replaces the infection control guidance published in October 2005. The changes and amendments in this edition are detailed on page 4 and include updated advice on aerosol- generating procedures. This advice takes into consideration and addresses the categorisation of such procedures in the recently published interim guidance from the World Health Organization on ‘Infection prevention and control of epidemic- and pandemic-prone acute respiratory diseases in health care’.

Draft guidance has been issued by the Department of Health to support planning for any incidence of pandemic influenza.

Pandemic flu: A national framework for responding to an influenza pandemic describes the Government’s strategic approach for responding to an influenza pandemic published jointly by the Department of Health and the Cabinet Office. It provides background information and guidance to public and private organisations developing response plans. It updates and expands upon health advice and information contained in previous plans issued by UK health departments and is intended to replace those documents.

Planning

Responding to pandemic influenza – The ethical framework for policy is designed to assist planners and strategic policy makers with ethical aspects of decisions they face before, during and after an influenza pandemic. It may also help clinicians and other health and social care professionals with decisions they need to make in the same context.

Pandemic influenza: surge capacity and prioritisation in health services - provisional UK guidance gives guidance on managing the surge capacity needed to respond to an increased volume of patients during an influenza pandemic.

Pandemic influenza: human resources guidance for the NHS is designed to give an overall framework for local organisations to build on/work within and deals in more detail with the workforce and human resource issues that may arise in the pandemic.

Pandemic influenza: Guidance on the management of death certification and cremation certification proposes changes to the procedures for death and cremation certification that could be used in a severe influenza pandemic in order to enable doctors to spend as much time as possible on the care of the living and to ensure that processes for death and cremation certification can be managed as effectively as possible during a pandemic

Service Based Guidance

Primary care guidance will assist primary care trusts (PCTs) in developing their plans for responding to an influenza pandemic. It is also intended to be a useful document for primary care professionals such as those working in general practice, community pharmacy and nursing, and for partner agencies providing services in the community setting. Also relating to the Primary Care setting is An operational and strategic framework: planning for pandemic influenza in adult social care which is supplementary to the revised national framework for responding to an influenza pandemic. It is intended to help local authorities, providers of social care services and PCT’s plan ahead for how they will manage and respond to the situation.

Pandemic influenza: Guidance for ambulance services and their staff in England provides ambulance trusts with a clear and pragmatic guidance to assist with their planning and reparations for an influenza pandemic. Specifically, it advises on national strategy, clinical management (including infection control) and business continuity planning.

Pandemic influenza: Guidance on preparing acute hospitals in England is designed to assist acute hospitals and foundation trusts in England in developing their plans for responding to an influenza pandemic.

Pandemic influenza: guidance on preparing mental health services in England is designed to assist mental health trusts and other specialist mental health service providers in developing their plans for responding to an influenza pandemic. This document details a national approach, setting out the key planning assumptions and principles, roles and responsibilities that should inform the development of local plans.

POPP is an initiative being led by the Department of Health, providing £60m funding to council-based partneships to set up innovative pilot projects to:

• Provide person-centred and integrated care for older people.
• Encourage investment in preventative approaches which promote health, well being and independence for older people.

The strategic aim of ‘Partnerships for Older People Projects’ is to test and evaluate innovative approaches that enable a sustained focus on prevention. It is expected that partnerships will demonstrate improved outcomes in:-

• Providing more low level care and support in the community with a view to preventing or delaying the need for higher intensity and more costly care
• Reducing avoidable emergency admissions to hospital
• Supporting more older people to live at home or in supported housing such as sheltered or Extra-care housing rather than in long-term residential care

Just published are interim reports on the projects progress.

• National Evaluation of Partnerships for Older People Projects: Interim report of progress
• National Evaluation of Partnerships for Older People Projects: Interim report of progress, Briefing paper: Cost-effectiveness, Measuring Effects: Emergency Bed-Day use

You can also check out the Mass Media Coverage 21/11/07 over on Fade the Blog.

Services for people with learning disabilities and challenging behaviour or mental health needs is best practice guidance to councils with social services responsibilities and health bodies. It is not mandatory and no extra resources will be provided for its implementation. Councils and health bodies should take it into account in setting their own priorities and policies. It will also be useful to people using services, their families and representatives, staff and those responsible for commissioning of local services as a statement of best practice. It is an updated version of the guidance originally produced by Professor Mansell and his project team in 1993.

This paper reports the findings of the evaluation of the Supporting People Health Pilots programme, which was established to demonstrate the policy links between housing support services and health and social care services by encouraging the development of integrated services. The paper highlights the challenges of working across housing, health and social care boundaries.

The challenges of joint working: lessons from the Supporting People Health Pilot evaluation
Ailsa Cameron, Geraldine Macdonald, William Turner, Liz Lloyd

The General Social Care Council’s statement of roles and tasks is the first official report on social work in England for nearly a generation.  A final draft of ‘Social Work at its Best - The Role of Social Work in 21st Century Care Services’ will give you details on the roles and responsibilities of social workers.