Need for social care army would be reduced with better quality, safer homes
The government has launched a new scheme whereby volunteers will help support patients as they are released from hospital back into their homes.
Our chief executive, Dr Carole Easton OBE, welcomes the initiative but argues that addressing the link between poor quality homes and health and social care pressures would bring even more meaningful impact.
The government has announced plans to recruit a new volunteer army for social care to help tackle the huge backlogs of patients stuck in NHS hospitals in England despite no longer meeting the criteria to be there.
Under the GoodSam app, volunteers might be tasked with transporting medical equipment and drugs to people’s homes, sent to people’s homes to help alleviate loneliness or asked to carry out shopping and other errands.
At Ageing Better, we welcome any steps taken to address the catastrophic delays that are preventing people from leaving hospital when they are well enough to do so.
And while this approach may prove effective in getting more people out of hospital more quickly, the government continues to overlook an extremely cost-effective preventative approach that helps reduce the need for people to seek hospital care in the first place.
Poor quality housing costs the NHS £1.4bn a year, damaging residents’ health by exposing them to excess cold or hazards which cause falls and injuries.
Every £1 spent on home improvements to reduce falls leads to £7.50 worth of savings for the health and care sector while every £1 spent on improving warmth in homes occupied by vulnerable households yields £4 in health benefits.
Instead of sticking plaster solutions in response to the consequences of these huge demand pressures, we need to look at the causes.
Earlier this year, the government gave the NHS a one-off payment of £200m to try to speed up hospital discharges by block buying beds in short-term social care facilities such as care homes where hospital patients could be safely discharged to.
This money could have been used to bring around 67,000 poor quality homes up to a Decent Homes Standard which would allow individuals to live in a home that is safer, warmer and more comfortable to live in.
Improving the quality of people’s homes would work as both a preventative measure to reduce the number of individuals going into hospital in the first place but may also speed up the process of discharge once they are ready to leave.
Often patients’ release from hospital can be held up because their home is deemed an unsuitable place to be returned to or because there is a wait for the fitting of aids and adaptions to make it easier for individuals to move around their homes such as grab rails or stair lifts.
Instead of sticking plaster solutions in response to the consequences of these huge demand pressures, we need to look at the causes.
Speeds of discharge could also be accelerated by increasing the number of accessible homes. Last summer, the government announced plans to require new homes to be built to higher accessibility standards. Almost a year on, there has been no progress and there is a risk that this legal requirement may not be pushed through before the end of this parliament. This would be a huge missed opportunity, and a failure to deliver on the promise in the 2019 Conservative manifesto to “make housing more affordable, accessible, and suitable for disabled people and an ageing population”.
We want to see much greater integration of housing within health and social care planning. Current plans are missing a trick.
What we know so far indicates that the GoodSam app is only looking at ways that volunteers can alleviate the pressures on the NHS once treatment has been completed. But what if that huge volunteering resource could be used to help with preventative measures too, what if it could also be used to support people to keep their homes safe and warm?
Integrated Care Systems (ICSs) are being asked to consider the role of housing, particularly where there are vulnerable populations living in damp, cold homes.
Some areas have responded to this call by investing in prevention, such as our joint work with West Yorkshire ICS who have invested in supporting those effected by fuel poverty. But we need to see more of this approach across the country.
We spend more than half our waking hours in our own home, with older people more likely to spend more time in their own home than the average person. The quality of our homes has enormous influence on our physical wellbeing and our mental health.
It is time housing was treated as much more than an afterthought when it comes to health and social care.
