Social Prescribing Link Worker

Job description

Job responsibilities

Primary Responsibilities

• Promoting social prescribing, its role in self-management, and the wider determinants of health
• Build relationships with key staff in GP practices within the local Primary Care Network (PCN), attending relevant meetings, becoming part of the wider network team, giving information and feedback on social prescribing and the referral process.
• Be proactive in developing strong links with all local agencies to encourage referrals, recognising what they need to be confident in the service to make appropriate referrals.
• Provide an advice and signposting service for service users, carers, and professionals
• Work in partnership with all local agencies to raise awareness of social prescribing and how partnership working can reduce pressure on statutory services, improve health outcomes and enable a holistic approach to care.
• Be an active part of the town wide network focusing on persons mental health
• Provide referral agencies with regular updates about social prescribing, including training for their staff and how to access information to encourage appropriate referrals.
• Seek regular feedback about the quality of service and impact of social prescribing on referral agencies.
• Be proactive in encouraging self-referrals and connecting with all local communities, particularly those communities that statutory agencies may find hard to reach.
• Regular participation in MDT discussions to benefit patient outcomes and follow appropriate safeguarding procedures.
• Proactively plan new projects and identify how best to evaluate outcomes.
• Growing and establishing the service.
• Flexibility to work in new ways

• Meet people on a one-to-one basis, making home visits where appropriate within organisations policies and procedures. Give people time to tell their stories and focus on what matters to me. Build trust with the person, providing non-judgemental support, respecting diversity and lifestyle choices. Work from a strength-based approach focusing on a persons assets.
• Be a friendly source of information about wellbeing and prevention approaches.
• Help people identify the wider issues that impact on their health and wellbeing, such as debt, poor housing, being unemployed, loneliness and caring responsibilities.
• Work with the person, their families and carers and consider how they can all be supported through social prescribing.
• Help people maintain or regain independence through living skills, adaptations, enablement approaches and simple safeguards.
• Work with individuals to co-produce a simple personalised support plan based on the persons priorities, interests, values, and motivations including what they can expect from the groups, activities, and services they are being connected to and what the person can do for themselves to improve their health and wellbeing.
• Work with people a range of needs, dealing with issues ranging from social isolation and keeping people engaged in their community, to prevent unnecessary admission to hospital or care homes.
• Where appropriate, physically introduce people to community groups, activities, and statutory services, ensuring they are comfortable. Follow up to ensure they are happy, able to engage, included and receiving good support.
• Where people may be eligible for a personal health budget, help them to explore this option as a way of providing funded, personalised support to be independent, including helping people to gain skills for meaningful employment, where appropriate.
• Assist people to access an assessment for Adult Social Care where appropriate, and to provide information in connection with personal budgets.
• Make follow up visits to patients and their carers to support them, facilitate the implementation of holistic care action plans and the coordination with other services.
• Ensure referrals are recorded within GP clinical systems using the new national SNOMED codes

• Forge strong links with local VCSE organisations, community, and neighbourhood level groups, utilising their networks and building on whats already available to create a map or menu of community groups and assets. Use these opportunities to promote micro-commissioning or small grants if available.
• Develop supportive relationships with local VCSE organisations, community groups and statutory services, to make timely, appropriate and supported referrals for the person being introduced.
• Ensure that local community groups and VCSE organisations being referred to have basic procedures in place for ensuring that vulnerable individuals are safe and, where there are safeguarding concerns, work with all partners to deal appropriately with issues. Where such policies and procedures are not in place, support groups to work towards this standard before referrals are made to them.
• Check that community groups and VCSE organisations meet in insured premises and that health and safety requirements are in place. Where such policies and procedures are not in place, support groups to work towards this standard before referrals are made to them.
• Support local groups to act in accordance with information governance policies and procedures, ensuring compliance with the Data Protection Act.

• Work with commissioners and local partners to identify unmet needs within the community and gaps in community provision.
• Support local partners and commissioners to develop new groups and services where needed, through small grants for community groups, micro-commissioning and development support.
• Encourage people who have been connected to community support through social prescribing to volunteer and give their time freely to others, in order to build their skills and confidence, and strengthen community resilience.
• Develop a team of volunteers within your service to provide buddying support for people, starting new groups and finding creative community solutions to local issues.
• Encourage people, their families and carers to provide peer support and to do things together, such as setting up new community groups or volunteering.
• Provide a regular confidence survey to community groups receiving referrals, to ensure that they are strong, sustained and have the support they need to be part of social prescribing.

• Work sensitively with people, their families and carers to capture key information, enabling tracking of the impact of social prescribing on their health and wellbeing.
• Encourage people, their families and carers to provide feedback and to share their stories about the impact of social prescribing on their lives.
• Support referral agencies to provide appropriate information about the person they are referring. Use the case management system to track the persons progress. Provide appropriate feedback to referral agencies about the people they referred.
• Work closely with GP practices within the PCN to ensure that social prescribing referral codes are inputted to EMIS and that the persons use of the NHS can be tracked, adhering to data protection legislation and data sharing agreements with the clinical commissioning group (CCG).

Education and Training

• To undertake training for Social Prescribing Link Workers as set out by the Personalised Care Institute.
• To maintain your own continuing professional development, keeping up to date with developments around Mental Health and Well-Being.
• To work to attain whatever quality assurance standards are required within both the employing organisation and within the Primary Care Mental Health Service.

Information management

• To maintain appropriate confidentiality of information relating to the organisation and its staff and maintain compliance with the Data Protection Act.
• To be responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of all patient and staff records
• Support good integrated governance and information governance practice within the practice
• Report any concerns or incidents as per policy

This job description is a summary of the main duties of the post and is, therefore, not exhaustive. This post will evolve over time and the job description may be amended accordingly.

The duties of the post will be reviewed regularly in conjunction with the post holder

Health & Safety

It is the responsibility of all employees to work with managers to achieve a healthy and safe environment, and to take reasonable care of themselves and others. Specific individual responsibilities for Health & Safety will be outlined under key responsibilities for the post.

Equality & Diversity

It is the responsibility of all employees to support Mid Hampshire Healthcares vision of promoting a positive approach to diversity and equality of opportunity, to eliminate discrimination and disadvantage in service delivery and employment, and to manage, support or comply through the implementation of the Mid Hampshire Healthcares Equality & Diversity Strategies and Policies.

Information Governance

As an employee you will have access to information that is sensitive to either an individual or to the organisation and you are reminded that in accordance with the requirements of Information Governance, NHS Code of Confidentiality, Data Protection Act 2018 and also the terms and conditions in your contract of employment, you have a duty to process this information judiciously and lawfully; failure to do so may result in disciplinary action.

PLEASE NOTE: we reserve the right to interview throughout the duration of theadvertising period, and if a suitable candidate is found we may withdraw theadvertprior to the published close date.

Person Specification

Personal Qualities & Attributes

Essential

• Ability to listen, empathise with people and provide person-centred support in a non-judgemental way
• Able to get along with people from all backgrounds and communities, respecting lifestyles and diversities
• Commitment to reducing health inequalities and proactively working to reach people from all communities
• Able to support people in a way that inspires trust and confidence, motivating others to reach their potential
• Ability to communicate effectively, both verbally and in writing, with people, their families, carers, community groups, partner agencies and stakeholders
• Ability to identify risk and assess/manage risk when working with individuals
• Have a strong awareness and understanding of when it is appropriate or necessary to refer people back to other health professionals/agencies, when what the person needs is beyond the scope of the link worker role e.g. when there is a mental health need requiring a qualified practitioner
• Able to work from an asset-based approach, building on existing community and personal assets
• Able to provide leadership and to finish work tasks
• Ability to maintain effective working relationships and to promote collaborative practice with all colleagues
• Commitment to collaborative working with all local agencies (including VCSE organisations and community groups). Able to work with others to reduce hierarchies and find creative solutions to community issues
• Demonstrates personal accountability, emotional resilience and works well under pressure
• Ability to organise, plan and prioritise on own initiative, including when under pressure and meeting deadlines
• High level of written and oral communication skills
• Ability to work flexibly and enthusiastically within a team or on own initiative

Desirable

• Understanding of the needs of small volunteer-led community groups and ability to support their development
• Knowledge of and ability to work to policies and procedures, including confidentiality, safeguarding, lone working, information governance, and health and safety

Experience

Essential

• Experience of working directly in a community development context, adult health, and social care, learning support or public health/health improvement (including unpaid work)
• Experience of supporting patients with healthy weight management
• Experience of supporting people, their families, and carers in a related role (including unpaid work)

Desirable

• Experience of supporting people with their mental health, either in a paid, unpaid or informal capacity
• Experience of working with the VCSE sector (in a paid or unpaid capacity), including with volunteers and small community groups
• Experience of data collection and providing monitoring information to assess the impact of services
• Experience of partnership/collaborative working and of building relationships across a variety of organisations

Qualifications

Essential

• Educated to GCSE level or equivalent including Mathematics and English
• Obtained relevant qualifications set out by the Personalised Care Institute or willing to study for these.
• Demonstrable commitment to professional and personal development

Desirable

• Training in motivational coaching and interviewing or equivalent experience

Knowledge and Skills

Essential

• Understanding of the wider determinants of health, including social, economic and environmental factors and their impact on communities
• Knowledge of IT systems, including ability to use word processing skills, emails and the internet to create simple plans and reports

Desirable

• Knowledge of the personalised care approach
• Knowledge of community development approaches
• Knowledge of motivational coaching and interview skills
• Knowledge of VCSE and community services in the locality

Other

Essential

• Meets DBS reference standards and has a clear criminal record, in line with the law on spent convictions
• Access to own transport and ability to travel across the locality on a regular basis, including to visit people in their own homes

Desirable

• Willingness to work flexible hours when required to meet work demands

Disclosure and Barring Service Check

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.

Employer details

Employer name

Andover Health Centre Medical Practice

Address

Andover PCN Office, 2nd Floor Chantry House, Chantry Centre

Andover

Hamphire

SP10 1RL

Employer's website

https://www.andoverhealthcentre.co.uk/ (Opens in a new tab)