Home from Hospital Pilot Evaluation

The Home from Hospital pilot programme is a tri-partner project between the British Red Cross, HelpForce and the Gateshead Health NHS foundation Trust. It is supported by the Garfield Weston Foundation.

We are working together for three essential reasons.

- We believe there is critical need for better support for the rapidly ageing population;

- The current pressures on the NHS and social services mean the public sector cannot fully fulfil this need; and

- Volunteers, with appropriate support, can plug essential gaps helping to fulfil these needs.

Based on these board principles we are piloting a volunteer led model to support patients.

This model would see patients initially referred by clinicians, with a patient assessment conducted before discharge to identify their likely needs; followed by ongoing support by BRC staff and volunteers for up to 6 weeks providing a mixture of practical and emotional support, information and advice and signposting, and support to re-engage the local community. It is hoped this model will lead to 3 core outcomes:

- Economic and efficiency savings for health service commissioners;

- Patients experience an improved quality-of-life; and

- The tri-partner service model is fully integrated and sustainable.

Service delivery began on January 11th 2018 and will run for two years (concluding January 2020)

The tri-partnership wish to commission an evaluator who will undertake three key objectives:

- Provide ongoing low level monitoring to feed into continuous service improvement;

- Understand the overall effectiveness of the programme and provide final recommendations about whether the model has the potential to expand, and any changes that could be made to help enhance overall best practice; and

- Help support the engagement of wider stakeholders and make them aware of the difference this work has made.