Welcome to the Adult Social Care Newsletter providing staff
with one source of information relating to adult care management, social care
provision and commissioning.
If you are a manager please ensure these details are read
and understood by your team members.
If you know of any staff who are not receiving the
newsletter, please let
us know.
Can’t find the Adult Social Care process maps on the Source?
Click here for a
direct link to the maps and supporting guidance.
Dear Colleagues
Firstly I wanted to wish you all a belated Happy and
Peaceful New Year. It’s also an
opportunity for me to thank you all for all your hard work and achievements in
2014. In spite of all the day to day
challenges and pressures that are faced, adult social care continues to perform
well and benchmarks so against other local authorities nationally. Some highlights are as follows:
- We are successfully supporting more people to
live at home with reducing numbers of people supported in residential and
nursing care
- There are year on year increases in the number
of people using direct payments to exercise increased choice and control (with
the Devon card proving successful in this respect)
-
The revised Care Pathway process is
demonstrating benefits in relation to reduced time for staff spent on
previously duplicative processes and the new approach has been developed and
implemented collaboratively
-
The major change programme in in-house services
is progressing well and both in-house staff and transition team members are working
successfully with service users and families to ensure positive and
person-centred outcomes
-
A reducing number of whole service safeguarding
situations as we increase work “upstream” with providers and with the NHS to
improve care
These are just a few examples but in the year ahead we will
be focussing in 3 key areas:
-
Preparing and implementing Care Act changes
-
Remodelling our service areas and some processes
(e.g. single RAS) to further promote equity, effectiveness and efficiency in
the way we work
-
Focussing on the quality of our practice
There will be further challenges and changes in all these
areas but we build on a good strong base in order to go forward. Lastly, but not leastly, there are a number of
people changes to report.
-
Carolyn
Elliott, Assistant Director in the Southern area retired at the end of
November and has been replaced by Gary
Patch on an interim basis.
-
Michael
Lloyd retired on 23 January and his post will be covered on an interim
basis by Liz Wood and Mark Gierke, pending changes in the
care management service.
-
Sarah
Mackereth will be the Principal Social Worker for the operational side of
adult social care from now on and a new post will be recruited in relation to
this function in adult social care commissioning.
-
Jan
Ingram will be acting Head of Service for the in-house service change
programme from now on and will also cover the Head of Service role on Fridays.
Please do read this newsletter and encourage all your
colleagues to do so as it will be the key communication tool for us.
Once again my thanks and best wishes to you all.
Sally Slade
Head of Adult Social Care
  Adult Social Care
Operational Remodelling (ASCOR) Project
The ASCOR project
was launched with managers on 13th November and includes the
following areas;
-
Integration
of learning disability, physical and sensory and older peoples care management
models (i.e. affecting CDP/CCTs/LD teams)
-
The
transition of safeguarding staff to operational teams and streamlining of
processes
-
Implementation
of principal Operations OT and SW roles
-
A
revised arrangement for the management of the retained in-house services
-
Consideration
of 7 day working to support hospital discharge
Two workshops have
been held to develop a working example of the proposals for North Devon. More information is available here
Care Act update
From April 2015, the Government pledges that care and
support in England is changing for the better.
The new care Act will help make the care and support system more
consistent across the country.
Our latest Care Act
update has been circulated to interested people and groups. It focuses on the national care and support
public information campaign starting soon (January – March 2015), and includes:
-
What to look for
-
Key messages
-
Supporting Carers
- Financial Planning
-
How we provide information
If you would like to
ask any questions, or make any suggestions about the Care Act implementation,
please email careact@devon.gov.uk
A fair and affordable
RAS project
Changes to the
adult My Assessment form and personal budgets processes are still scheduled for
9th February.
This change includes:
-
A new
version of the My Assessment form
-
Changes
to RAS screens and the way the RAS calculates a person’s estimated budget
Changes to RAS
screens and implications to assessments open on 6th February are
significant so please take
time to look at the A fair and affordable RAS web page which is regularly updated with
latest detail. Included on this page
currently is:
-
The
final version of the My Assessment (updated slightly from the version in
training packs)
-
Updated
copies of new RAS screens along with supporting information
-
Answers
to your FAQs regarding the changeover from old forms and processes to new
-
An
updated version of the training pack
Price increase April
2015 – Supporting providers to develop capacity
Improving the availability of personal care is a top
priority, and Devon County Council has advised domiciliary care providers of
substantial additional investment which will be available through the April
inflationary uplift. More details are
available here
Safeguarding Adults
News
Useful updates from Safeguarding Adults on the following
topics:
Residential and Day
Care Services update
As we start the New
Year, we are a third of the way through the programme which sees the authority
cease directly providing residential and day care services at 20 care homes and
13 day centres. We have been clear throughout
the process, that no-one will be moved until they have been supported to find a
suitable, alternative home or day service.
We’ve had some wonderful feedback from people who have felt empowered to
make life choices both for themselves and for their families. For more details on the progress made so far
and commentary from residents, service users, families and transition workers
experiencing the changes, click here
In addition to the
above, Well UK has been carrying out research on behalf of Devon County Council
to review the way our Transition Team has worked with, and supported,
individuals and their families during their moves from our residential care
homes to private/voluntary sector care homes.
Read the summary of findings from the interim report on
Phase 1 residential transitions.
Better Care Fund update
The Better Care Fund plan has been fully approved (click
here for approval letter) and will go live on the Devon Health and
Wellbeing website shortly.
CareFirst Update
System
changes – For details of the system changes that affected Adult services in
January click here
Exciting and
challenging social work careers in Devon
What’s it like being a social worker in Devon? What are the challenges? The opportunities?
Watch
our short film starring our very own social workers Rosie and Katrina, to
see how we’re transforming social work and how we can help you to make a
change, and a difference, here in Devon.
(You will need head phones or speakers).
Do you know
a great social worker? Find out more
about social work opportunities on our website.
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