Policies for Partnership Working in Health and Social Care

Policies for union Working in wellness and cordial C arThe league betwixt health and brotherly boot go policies in UKIntroductionFor the past decade or so, the focus within health and social work has been on improving all-round services with partnership in the midst of different transcriptions. The aim of this has been to modify integration, efficiency and provide better c atomic number 18 for all types of patients in the community. However, the policies involved in both(prenominal) health and social mission services nurse not always allowed the partnerships to work as they should. Whilst there have been some successes and partnerships have improved integration and oerall take, there have excessively been mistakes that in some typefaces have made things worse rather than better.1The aim of this endeavor is to track the increase of the partnership between health and welfare services over the last ten years or so, and how effective this partnership has been. thit her will be a critical review of partnership policy, and a focused case study on the authorized Start partnership as an example of how partnerships between health and social services in the UK are fairing.The development of a partnership between health and welfare serviceThe development of partnerships between health and welfare services has been a critical focus of New drive policy over the last ten years. However, these terms are often not defined curiously closely and are therefore fairly difficult to analyse. The problem is that collaboration and partnership between the organisations is difficult in light of different stopping points and power relationships within the professions.2 However, this has not stopped attempts by New Labour to create partnerships between health and social care through various initiatives and policies.It was in 1999 that the governing body set come out of the closet its radical NHS Plan that promised to transform the way in which health and socia l services interacted. The development of condole with Trusts meant that health and social services would be dealt with by a singular organisation in certain areas for the first time. The main focus of the changes being on child services, service for the elderly and mental health services.3The first problem of evolution partnerships was to overcome the difficulties and issues between new staff committed to the partnership and sure-enough(a) staff who had worked in the organisations as separate entities. The UK Centres of Excellence funded by the DfES were created in an effort to combine high quality services in one place. These accordingly led to specific Childrens Centres. The idea was to combine disciplines of health and social care in one arena as a focus on a specific group of individuals in this case families and children.4The focus for many of the partnership policies and initiatives has been on children, families and the elderly in an effort to provide better merged car e for these groups.One of the biggest developments within partnerships between health care and social care has been to empower those who use the services in an effort to smooth over integration. The idea is that with drug user alliance these organisations will better understand how to work as a partnership to help the needs of the user. If the users can help to general anatomy service standards, then differences between the organisations will be reduced and effective partnership will be increased.5The idea behind this is also to manage intimate diversity within the country as a society and the diversity within organisations so that these different parts can work together much easily.6 The partnerships and their success are looked at in two ways. Firstly, how well the partners can work together to address mutual aims, and also how service delivery and personal effects on health and well-being of service users has been improved.7The focus of policy has been on inter-organisationa l partnerships between health and social care, rather than focusing on individual professionals working(a)(a) together between organisations. The development should be seen as NHS working with DfES/DCSF rather than GPs, doctors and nurses working with social workers.8The biggest shift has been the creation of the simple awe Groups and lot Trusts which are responsible for the welfare of healthcare services in the community. These organisations are being encouraged to work with social services so that intermediate care can be provided, hospital waiting lists can be cut and the roots of issues can be sorted rather than merely the outcomes being treated. The organic law of Care Trusts that try to combine health and social services in one organisation has been somewhat hit and miss in the UK.9 The next slit will critically examine these policies.Critical review of partnership policyOne of the biggest problems with these policies is that many of the terms used are exceedingly vagu e and it is herculean to evaluate their effectiveness. Partnership is not accurately defined by most of the policies, and this leaves the concept open to interpretation.10The concept of user booking and feedback within the policy is also rather poorly defined, and this means that the effectiveness of user participation to bring together health and social services tools is rarely monitored.11 There needs to be more feedback for users on their participation within these organisations, and the participation of users needs to be tied directly into policy to improve partnerships.12The term purification is also given importance in the policies because it determines how the organisations work together in the partnership and work with users of the services. However, studies have sh confess this term has not been given a universal meaning and topical anaesthetic organisations have given the term different meanings. This leads to inconsistent services and fluctuating success within a par tnership.13However, there have been some benefits of the increased user participation within health and social care partnerships. It has allowed users to gain more power within the relationship and in many ways help to self-manage their own needs more clearly. This is certainly the care within health and social care partnerships for the elderly community. Rather than being seen as a drain on resources, the fourth-year generation can now work with health and social services to maintain a higher quality of life and continually abide to society. With health and social care working together in this way, the elderly community have better access to their needs as well as being more efficiently care for due to the organisational collaboration.14The difference here is that whereas before an elderly person would be seen separately by the NHS and by esoteric and government-based social services agencies, these organisations now work together to provide all primary care needs in one package . This makes it easier for all involved in the process.15 It removes the boundaries that have been such an issue for many older people over the decades within the UK welfare system.16The problem of course arises when the partnership as a entirely is not serving the needs of individuals. Whereas before an individual may be failed by one organisation, now the failure will cover all the services they require. With the health and social services organisations also working with private entities such as insurers, if one area fails then the service package as a integral can fail.17The problem is still that the two markets of health and social care are organisationally opposed. The culture within the organisations is geared towards competition rather than cooperation, and this has been extremely hard to overcome.18 The disciplines have appoint it hard to build up levels of trust that allow for self-made communication and partnership.19Despite these problems with policy, there have been cases where policies have launch partnerships between health and social services. One of these partnership initiatives is known as Sure Start. The next section will present a case study of this partnership to evaluate its strengths and weaknesses.Case study of sure startThe Sure Start program was created in the early years of the New Labour government and looked to help children and families both before and after(prenominal) birth in a holistic and co-ordinated way. This includes provided healthcare and social care for children, as well as providing in-need adults with social care that they can benefit from. The government put a large amount of money into the project from 1998 onwards, and has rolled the program out a skip the country.20The program sees all health and social care service providers work together to benefit parents and children in a wide variety of ways, particularly for vulnerable children and those with learning difficulties. These issues can benefit from an coo rdinated approach that combines different aspects of health and social care in one package.21Reports from this program in topical anesthetic anaesthetic areas show that commitment to partnerships and cooperation has been high amongst the staff involved. Those involved in the partnership, whether health and social services staff or parent members, found the experience to be positive and allowed for a more integrated approach to family welfare. Work with families has improved somewhat, although there are still problems.The biggest problem to the effectiveness of the partnership is differing organisational cultures. These cultures mean that health and social services cannot always work effectively together, and that there are also limits on parental involvement. Parents found that the bureaucratic cultures of the organisations meant they were reluctant to participate foster in the partnership. Likewise, staff within the different organisations found it hard to work with certain othe r staff because of differences in organisational culture.22In other studies, the results were even poorer. Rutter found that the objective of Sure Start to eliminate child poverty and social exclusion was not being met. The results of National Evaluations of the Sure Start Team were analysed and showed that after 3 years, there was no significant service improvement. In fact, in some areas the service had got worse and had made the situations of families worse.23The problem here was that whilst the partnership was working successful in bringing together health and social services, this was not improving the actual services offered on both sides. With only one organisation to now use, the most disadvantaged families were being let down in all areas rather than just in a few areas. It seems that many of the weaknesses of both organisations were combined in the partnership rather than their strengths.Other results show mixed results. One study showed that the partnership had been effec tive for teenage mothers in improving their parenting, precisely the actual children of such mothers were in some cases worse off. The problem seems to be not with the concept of the partnership itself, but the actual practical effectiveness of the local organisations involved in the particular partnership and the level of communication and cooperation between different staff.24Overall, the project has certainly been a success in developing integrated financial backing networks for children and families throughout the UK. However, the effectiveness of this support network has been hindered in many areas because of different organisational cultures and a lack of adequate management capacity across the disciplines. These ethnic problems have also limited the effectives of service user participation in some areas, and this is something that needs to be addressed in the future if these partnerships are to be successful.25ConclusionThe policies of the New Labour government have tried t o overcome the previous problems of drawing together the health and social services into one partnership. These organisations have always been highly separate, and attempts in the 1980s and early 1990s to foster cooperation between them often failed because of the differences in the organisations.26 The issue has been that trying to find a debauched and effective solution to the boundaries between health and social care is difficult, although it is attainable in the long-term.27The partnerships themselves have actually been quite successful in creating sustainable and integrated local support networks across the UK. However, the effectiveness of these partnerships has been damaged by a number of factors.Firstly, there is still too much competition and a culture of blaming the other organisation between health and social services. Both organisations would prefer to ab bring in themselves of responsibility and compete for success rather than work together to solve the problem togethe r. Although when things go right the partnership can work, when things go wrong both parties look to blame the other side. This means many users are let down by the partnership with no-one taking responsibility for the failure.28Also, there has been too much emphasis on inter-organisational cooperation rather than inter-professional cooperation. Whilst organisations as a whole are difficult to change because of imbedded cultures and management styles, individual professionals can quickly be shown how to work together to both achieve better results for their respective organisations. The government policies should be more focused on getting individuals within different organisations (e.g. doctors and social workers) than looking at combining whole organisations. This gives the user the integrated support they need whilst still allowing the different organisations to concentrate on what they do best.29In conclusion, partnerships between the health and social services in the UK can wor k to improve support for those who need it. However, the focus needs to shift from inter-organisational cooperation to inter-professional cooperation if the partnerships that have been successfully set up are to be effective in the future.BibliographyAnning, A (2005) look into the impact of working in multi- operation service delivery setting in the UK on early years practitioners beliefs and practices. Journal of Early Childhood Research, 3(1), pp.19-50 Balloch, S and Taylor, M (2001) Partnership Working Policy and Practice. Bristol The Policy Press.Barnes, M, Newman, J and Sullivan, H (2004) Power, participation and political variation theoretical and empirical perspectives on public participation under new Labour. Social Politics, 11(2), pp. 267-279. Belsky, J et al (2006) Effects of Sure Start local programmes on children and families early findings from a quasi-experimental, cross sectional study. BMJ, 332, p. 1476.Brown, L, Tucker, C, and Domokos, T (2003) Evaluating the im pact of integrated health and social care teams on older people living in the community. Health and Social Care in the Community, 11(2), pp. 85-94.Carnwell, R and Buchanan, J (2005) rough-and-ready Practice in Health and Social Care A Partnership Approach. Maidenhead Open University Press.Carpenter, J, Griffin, M and Brown, S (2005) The Impact of Sure Start on Social Services. Durham Centre for Applied Social Research. Available at http//www.dcsf.gov.uk/ research/data/uploadfiles/SSU2005FR015.pdfCarr, S (2004) Has service user participation made a difference to social care services? capital of the United Kingdom Social Care institute for Excellence. Available at http//www.scie.org.uk/publications/positionpapers/pp03.aspClarke, J (2005) New Labours citizens activated, empowered, responsibilized, given over? Critical Social Policy, 25, pp. 447-463.Dowling, B, Powell, M, and Glendinning, C (2004) Conceptualising successful partnership. Health and Social Care in the Community, 12(4), pp. 309-317.DCSF (2008) Sure Start Partnership Work. SureStart Website. Available at http//www.surestart.gov.uk/stepintolearning/setup/feinvolvement/partnership/ (Accessed 27th December 2008).Gilson, L (2003) Trust and the development of health care as a social institution. Social Science and Medicine, 56(7), pp. 1453-1468.Glasby, J and Peck, E (2004) Care Trusts Partnership Working in Action. Oxford Radcliffe Publishing.Glass, N (1999) Sure Start the development of an early intervention programme for young children in the United Kingdom. Children and Society, 13(4), pp. 257-264.Glendinning, C (2002) Partnerships between health and social services developing a framework for evaluation. Policy and Politics, 30(1), pp. 115-127.Glendinning, C, Powell, M A and Rummery, K (2002) Partnerships, New Labour and the Governance of Welfare. Bristol The Policy Press.Ham, C (1997) Health Care elucidate Learning from International Experience. Plenary Session I Reframing Health Care Policies. Avai lable at http//www.ha.org.hk/archives/hacon97/contents/26.pdfHudson, B (1999) Joint commissioning across the primary health caresocial care boundary can it work? Health and Social Care in the Community, 7(5), pp. 358-366.Hudson, B (2002) Interprofessionality in health and social care the Achilles heel of partnership? Journal of Interprofessional Care, 16(1), pp. 7-17.Leathard, A (1994) Going Inter-professional Working Together for Health and Welfare. London Routledge.Leathard, A (2003) Interprofessional Collaboration From Policy to Practice in Health and Social Care. New York Routledge.Lewis, J (2001) Older People and the HealthSocial Care Boundary in the UK Half a Century of Hidden Policy Conflict. Social Policy and Administration, 35(4), pp. 343-359.Lymbery, M (2006) Untied we stand? Partnership working in health and social care and the role of social work in services for older people. British Journal of Social Work, 36, pp. 1119-1134.Maddock, S and Morgan, G (1998) Barriers to r enewal Beyond bureaucracy and the market conditions for collaboration in health and social care. International Journal of Public Sector Management, 11(4), pp. 234-251.Martin, V (2002) Managing Projects in Health and Social Care. New York Routledge.Myers, P, Barnes, J and Brodie, I (2003) Partnership Working in Sure Start Local Programmes Early findings from local programme evaluations. NESS Synthesis Report 1. Available at http//www.ness.bbk.ac.uk/documents/synthesisReports/23.pdfNewman, J et al (2004) Public participation and collaborative governance. Journal of Social Policy and Society, 33, pp. 203-223.Peck, E, Towell, D and Gulliver, P (2001) The meanings of culture in health and social care a case study of the combined Trust in Somerset . Journal of Interprofessional Care, 15(4), pp. 319-327.Rummery, K and Coleman, A (2003) Primary health and social care services in the UK progress towards partnership? Social Science and Medicine, 56(8), pp. 1773-1782.Rutter, M (2006) Is Sure Start an Effective Preventive Intervention? Child and Adolescent Mental Health, 11(3), pp. 135-141.Stanley, N and Manthorpe, J (2004) The Age of Inquiry Learning and Blaming in Health and Social Care. New York Routledge.1Footnotes1 Leathard, A (1994) Going Inter-professional Working Together for Health and Welfare. London Routledge, pp. 6-92 Lymbery, M (2006) Untied we stand? Partnership working in health and social care and the role of social work in services for older people. British Journal of Social Work, 36, pp. 1128-1131.3 Glasby, J and Peck, E (2004) Care Trusts Partnership Working in Action. Oxford Radcliffe Publishing, pp. 1-24 Anning, A (2005) Investigating the impact of working in multi- agency service delivery setting in the Uk on early years practitioners beliefs and practices. Journal of Early Childhood Research, 3(1), pp.19-215 Barnes, M, Newman, J and Sullivan, H (2004) Power, participation and political renewal theoretical and empirical perspectives on public partic ipation under new Labour. Social Politics, 11(2), pp. 267-270.6 Clarke, J (2005) New Labours citizens activated, empowered, responsibilized, abandoned? Critical Social Policy, 25, pp. 449-4537 Dowling, B, Powell, M, and Glendinning, C (2004) Conceptualising successful partnership. Health and Social Care in the Community, 12(4), pp. 309-312.8 Hudson, B (2002) Interprofessionality in health and social care the Achilles heel of partnership? Journal of Interprofessional Care, 16(1), pp. 10-14.9 Rummery, K and Coleman, A (2003) Primary health and social care services in the UK progress towards partnership? Social Science and Medicine, 56(8), pp. 1777-1780.10 Glendinning, C (2002) Partnerships between health and social services developing a framework for evaluation. Policy and Politics, 30(1), pp. 115-117.11 Carr, S (2004) Has service user participation made a difference to social care services? London Social Care institute for Excellence. Available at http//www.scie.org.uk/publications/p ositionpapers/pp03.asp12 Newman, J et al (2004) Public participation and collaborative governance. Journal of Social Policy and Society, 33, pp. 217-220.13 Peck, E, Towell, D and Gulliver, P (2001) The meanings of culture in health and social care a case study of the combined Trust in Somerset . Journal of Interprofessional Care, 15(4), pp. 323-325.14 Balloch, S and Taylor, M (2001) Partnership Working Policy and Practice. Bristol The Policy Press, pp. 143-145.15 Leathard, A (2003) Interprofessional Collaboration From Policy to Practice in Health and Social Care. New York Routledge, pp. 102-10316 Lewis, J (2001) Older People and the HealthSocial Care Boundary in the UK Half a Century of Hidden Policy Conflict. Social Policy and Administration, 35(4), pp. 343-344.17 Ham, C (1997) Health Care Reform Learning from International Experience. Plenary Session I Reframing Health Care Policies. Available at http//www.ha.org.hk/archives/hacon97/contents/26.pdf, p. 2518 Maddock, S and Morgan, G (1998) Barriers to transformation Beyond bureaucracy and the market conditions for collaboration in health and social care. International Journal of Public Sector Management, 11(4), pp. 234-235.19 Gilson, L (2003) Trust and the development of health care as a social institution. Social Science and Medicine, 56(7), pp. 1463-1466.20 Glass, N (1999) Sure Start the development of an early intervention programme for young children in the United Kingdom. Children and Society, 13(4), pp. 257-259.21 DCSF (2008) Sure Start Partnership Work. SureStart Website. Available at http//www.surestart.gov.uk/stepintolearning/setup/feinvolvement/partnership/ (Accessed 27th December 2008).22 Myers, P, Barnes, J and Brodie, I (2003) Partnership Working in Sure Start Local Programmes Early findings from local programme evaluations. NESS Synthesis Report 1. Available at http//www.ness.bbk.ac.uk/documents/synthesisReports/23.pdf23 Rutter, M (2006) Is Sure Start an Effective Preventive Intervention? Child and Adolescent Mental Health, 11(3), pp. 137-140.24 Belsky, J et al (2006) Effects of Sure Start local programmes on children and families early findings from a quasi-experimental, cross sectional study. BMJ, 332, p. 1476.25 Carpenter, J, Griffin, M and Brown, S (2005) The Impact of Sure Start on Social Services. Durham Centre for Applied Social Research. Available at http//www.dcsf.gov.uk/research/data/uploadfiles/SSU2005FR015.pdf, pp. 44-4826 Glendinning, C, Powell, M A and Rummery, K (2002) Partnerships, New Labour and the Governance of Welfare. Bristol The Policy Press, pp. 34-3627 Hudson, B (1999) Joint commissioning across the primary health caresocial care boundary can it work? Health and Social Care in the Community, 7(5), pp. 363-365.28 Stanley, N and Manthorpe, J (2004) The Age of Inquiry Learning and Blaming in Health and Social Care. New York Routledge, pp. 1-529 Martin, V (2002) Managing Projects in Health and Social Care. New York Routledge, pp. 180-190