Wendy Lowder works for Barnsley Council – one of the pilot sites developing the Common Assessment Framework for Adults. The Barnsley pilot is focussed on two end-products, CAF messaging and the development of a citizens portal.
The CAF team in Barnsley is developing the ‘citizens portal’, building a secure online portal to enable people to undertake their initial assessment and to identify what they are seeking to change or improve, with the aim of giving them a joined up view across all health and care services.
The Common Assessment Framework (CAF) – and specifically the citizen’s portal – provide a tool for collecting information from people to help assess their care needs more easily and quickly. It will provide access to all the organisations offering different care services in the local area. This means that people can be directed to information and services and supports rather than having to find them for themselves.
“The citizens portal has been developed in conjunction with service users to make it as user friendly as possible,” says Wendy Lowder, Assistant Director – Personalisation, Barnsley Council. The aim is to make the assessment process easier, fairer and more efficient for users, and to tackle some of problems people were having in accessing care and support services.
A service user steering group was created with a wide range of people, including those who were less able to use computers. This has helped to overcome accessibility problem and has been a challenge for Barnsley’s IT partner.
It is only with recent improvements to Barnsley Council’s IT systems that Wendy and her colleagues have been able to make good progress with the common assessment framework. Without these improvements it was impossible for computer systems in the NHS and Social Care to speak to each other, and there is no one place where a holistic view of the person’s situation can be viewed either by an individual or organisations.
So how will the common assessment system work?
Information submitted online to the local Council by a member of the public can be sent to the appropriate organisation or team who can acknowledge receipt of the contact, create a unique identifier for the individual and communicate with them by email. The individual will eventually be able to create their own initial assessment, get eligibility and personal budget confirmation online, do their own support plan online and submit this electronically. The service user, the NHS and Social Services will have one view of the person, what they are hoping to achieve, who is involved and what services are being accessed.
While Barnsley Council recognises that using the internet is not everyone’s cup of tea, they are trying to design a system that’s as future-proof as possible. So although for most people using this service means completing online forms, support is in place for those who need it. The plan is that this support will be provided by a range of organisations, statutory, community and third sector.
Wendy says that to develop a CAF, and to get the most out of joined up working, things must be carefully thought through in advance. Shared ownership is very important.
“Things will only work where there is a willingness to work together,” says Wendy.
Delivering the CAF is set in the context of Barnsley’s partnership arrangements.
“Barnsley has strong history of partnership working, where people co-operate with willingness, we do not have all the answers but through collaboration we can usually get to where we want to be. There are a whole host of partnership meetings, and organisations and their staff frequently work together,” says Wendy.
Barnsley currently has a ‘Partnership in Action Agreement’ with pooled budgets and through this arrangement, challenges are faced, and solutions created, in partnership.
Wendy feels that the CAF will be a great system. Designing the CAF with service user and professionals across a range of organisations is a good example of how joined up working can deliver better care services and improve working practices.