Essex Village Agents

“SUCCESS STORY”

CASE STUDY

Essex Village Agents

Summary
The Village Agents pilot project operates in the rural areas of Braintree, Maldon and Chelmsford districts, providing face to face information and guidance to ‘hard to reach’ groups. Village Agents make appropriate referrals to statutory, non-statutory and 3rd sector organisations where required, as well as providing sign-posting, information and advice on local amenities, groups and facilities.
Recruited locally, the Village Agents have an abundance of information at their fingertips and are in constant contact with local organisations and service providers to enable them to provide the most up-to-date advice to their customers.
There are 12 Agents and an online referral system to link people to services. The overall aim is to:
·  Put people in contact with organisations that provide services they need
·  Provide high quality information and advice
·  Promote health and independence
Working as a well equipped team the Village Agents offer free personal information and signposting to many services such as:
·  Home adaptations and equipment to make life easier and safer
·  Home security, fire safety checks and smoke alarm fitting
·  Housing and getting jobs done around the home and garden
·  Healthy living advice and activities such as fitness, weight loss or smoking cessation
·  Making sure you are receiving the correct benefits or pension
·  Information about all forms of travel and access to community transport
·  Support opportunities for your family or carers
·  Help you to become a volunteer to help others
·  Access to local social groups, leisure activities and learning opportunities
Agents can help people choose the best service. The project aims to:
·  Provide independent, confidential trusted advice
·  Complement not duplicate existing services
·  Reduce confusion and add value to service choice
·  Help anyone in need, particularly the elderly and families
·  Share information and experience
·  Inform future Adult Health and Community Wellbeing strategy
The signposting is assisted by the on-line referral system, which is now fully operational and linked to the new Village Agents website www.villageagentsessex.org.uk where information about the services, news, events and how to contact the agents can be found.
Outline of achievement or improvement delivered
The Joint Strategic Needs Assessment provides a detailed breakdown on the demographic changes across the county but of particular interest in this summary is the percentage change of older people expected in each of the localities. The table below highlights the need to consider the impact of an ageing population upon all services that affect one’s life and not just the requirements on providing social care. In addition we now have the opportunity to value those people in later life as an important contributor to society with many skills and knowledge as opposed to a burden.
Due to the aging population and a number of studies* (*Focusing on Older People An Insight into Gloucestershire’s Resident Older Population GCCED 2004, Research into Accessibility for Older People in Rural areas in Gloucestershire Patel and Horseman 2003) identifying that older people in rural areas are less likely to use traditional access channels the Village Agent Essex Pilot project provides an appropriate access channel to prevention and wellbeing services; advice and information.
The current estimates of the Essex population of people aged 50+ are 500 thousand people. This is expected to rise by 4% in 2010, 14% by 2015 and 24% by 2020.Mid Essex has been identified as ideal for the Pilot as Braintree and Maldon are districts that are projected to increase the most with a 33% and 32% increase in aged 50+ from 2007-2020. This is in line with an over 65’s increase of 28% overall by 2015.
Pop Projections / % Change
50+ / MYE 2007 / 2007-2010 / 2007-2015 / 2007-2020
Essex / 500,111 / 4% / 14% / 24%
Basildon / 55,746 / 4% / 12% / 21%
Braintree / 49,381 / 6% / 19% / 33%
Brentwood / 26,564 / 3% / 11% / 18%
Castle Point / 36,440 / 4% / 13% / 21%
Chelmsford / 56,141 / 4% / 13% / 21%
Colchester / 55,115 / 3% / 14% / 25%
Epping Forest / 44,801 / 3% / 11% / 21%
Harlow / 24,522 / 3% / 10% / 16%
Maldon / 24,375 / 7% / 18% / 32%
Rochford / 31,681 / 5% / 14% / 24%
Tendring / 68,813 / 4% / 15% / 26%
Uttlesford / 26,532 / 6% / 17% / 28%
England / 17,278,930 / 4% / 13% / 22%
The latest referral figures for the Village Agents pilot are as follows (as of end Sept ’10):
·  801 clients
·  1972 referrals and activities
Type of activity / referral includes:
·  Community safety (14.5%)
Referrals relate to safety in the home and neighbourhood, such as smoke
detectors and security checks
·  Prevention - Health and Care (45.5%)
Referrals relate to advice (on alcohol and smoking), fitness training, falls
prevention, home insulation, adaptations, Telecare, personal and carer support
·  Income maximisation (7.5%)
Referrals relate to pension credits, housing benefits and Council tax
·  Social Care (6%)
Referrals to Social Care Direct and Safeguarding
·  Housing (13.5%)
Referrals relate to accommodation and other general district/borough council
services
·  Accessibility (13.1%)
Referrals relate to transport, jobs, learning, social interaction, sport and
active recreation and volunteering
There are currently over 80 formal referral partners from across the three pilot areas. .
The project has set out to achieve:
·  An understanding of the expectations of an ageing population
·  Equality in terms of access to services
·  Replicate the success demonstrated in Gloucestershire
·  Try new methods of engaging with people living in rural villages
·  Demonstrate the value from actively seeking people that need more support
·  Preventing or delaying the need for more costly critical care
·  Inform organisations about the unmet need for services
·  Improve service delivery effectiveness and efficiency
·  Promote the wide range of statutory and voluntary services available
The Village Agents pilot has completed its first 12months and we have been reviewing the pilot throughout the year. The review has included over 70 case studies, which have highlighted the valuable service that has been provided to isolated and vulnerable older people in rural parts of mid-Essex. The project is currently undertaking a detailed evaluation report and full information on impact will follow, though anecdotal evidence so far suggests the project is operating very successfully and has met its overall aims.
The project relates to the following:
Total Place - Local outcomes - Understanding individual and community need through a local presence and request, referral and activity data
Prioritisation - Feedback on the need for services, the capacity to respond and customer satisfaction.
Prevention - Retaining independence to delay or prevent the need for more critical and costly care.
Personalisation - A single face to face gateway to a huge range of services tailored to the individuals needs.
Sustainability - Helping to set up new groups, promoting local activity and support (time bank)
Co-design - An insight to the under and over met need for services both in terms of category and location
Alignment - Making available data that can influence the creation of stronger and more effective partnerships
Cost savings - An evaluation of the benefit value compared to the delivery cost. One agent can promote and provide access to hundreds of services.
How was this delivered?
The project is jointly funded by Essex County Council, Braintree Local Strategic Partnership and NHS Mid Essex and is being delivered by the Rural Community Council of Essex (RCCE). This new and exciting pilot project is operating in 48 villages and parishes across Mid Essex until March 2011, primarily supporting older people in isolated, rural areas to improve their access to health and wellbeing services and enable them to live a better quality of life.
The chosen villages were introduced to the agents on 15 October 2009 and are already making full use of the expertise, networks and knowledge provided. The 12 Village Agents are in turn working hard to make contact with local people and begin to build trusted relationships in each of their allocated communities, which were all chosen carefully following consultation with stakeholders and a review of existing facilities.
The following approach was taken:
·  Review of age of Population
·  Indices of Multiple Deprivation
·  Services available - Eg. Post Office, GP
·  Public Transport
·  Existence of supporting organisations
·  Stakeholder feedback
·  Agent recruitment
·  A cost benefit analysis approach is being used to evaluate the project based on risk reduction, time savings and local income
What are the prospects for further improvement?
·  Area of promotion to increase in line with expectations
·  Increase awareness through wider brand and system deployment
·  Agents to undertake additional tasks
·  Increase productivity and drive down unit cost
·  Shared knowledge about local need and interventions. The value of the data in relation to future strategy and joint working
·  ’Why Not Older Peoples Researchers’ to carry out research about older persons emotional journey
·  Set up new groups and support others such as “Timebank”
Learning
The initial promotion of the pilot project has resulted in significant interest in the service and the trusting and positive response from clients has highlighted this. The referral system has made it easy to provide clients with a bundle of services and supported a real network of organisations. The service has highlighted the benefits of providing effective triage to maximising potential gains
The project has identified that promoting the service must be undertaken at a local level and as a result the Village Agents have linked directly with parish newsletters. This has involved placing regular adverts and editorial, as well as other forms promotion such attending local groups.
We have learned:
·  The benefits of client focus approach to promote independence.
·  The value of independent signposting
·  Supporting one person can help many i.e. families, friends carers
·  Individual benefits and increase in quality of life
·  The importance of feedback from clients via Case studies.
·  The potential value of the performance information collected by the online referral systems to support effective commissioning
Supporting Evidence

Key Contacts / Further information
Andy Payne, Strategy Manager, Community Wellbeing, tel; 01245 244987