Sheffield Local Involvement Network

'Equipment & Adaptation Services in Sheffield'

On Friday 26th March, we delivered our report (download above) on assessments for Equipment and Adaptations to Sheffield City Council (SCC). This report is the culmination of a lot of work by the Action Group over a number of months.

Working with SCC, they surveyed everyone who requested an assessment in May and June 2009 to find out their views. Overall, people were positive about the service provided by SCC. 94% were satisfied with the way in which their assessment was carried out and 99% felt they were treated with dignity and respect.

The main issue, however, was that 30% of respondents had to wait longer than 4 weeks to be assessed. Of those, half waited between 4 and 13 weeks and that other half waited more than 13 weeks. This is despite the Department of Health (DH) having a target of 4 weeks for everyone to be assessed.

The report makes 6 recommendations:

1. To reduce waiting time for assessments within 12 months to meet a 4-week target
2. To meet 85% of requests for either male or female assessors
3. To ensure all information for people requesting support is clear and continually updated
4. To produce care pathways for the E&A Service
5. To ensure the involvement and engagement of service users in all deveopment of the service
6. To make sure that future developments reflect the changing population charateristics of service users.

SCC has now responded to our report and recommendations and are meeting with the Action Group in mid-July to look at how the recommendations can be taken forward.

Background information

Statistics about the population of Sheffield show that we are living longer and mostly in better health than we used to. However, with this more people need specialist equipment and adaptations to their homes to support their daily lives.

Sheffield LINk discovered that local people were concerned both about the length of time they had to wait before they received any help and how they were assessed. We formed an Action Group to investigate and make practical recommendations on what could be improved. By working closely with the Council on this survey we'll be able to meet our joint needs and demonstrate in a practical way that Sheffield LINk makes a real difference to local people.

Find out more about equipment and adaptations in Sheffield.

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