Collaborative communities and the impact of social prescribing
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Towards community owned and led collaborative communities: Can effective social prescribing models enhance health and wellbeing on a systems level?
IRAS ID
315571
Contact name
Basma Ellahi
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University of Chester
Duration of Study in the UK
1 years, 6 months, 0 days
Research summary
Social Prescribing (SP) aims to support patients with their non-medical social needs, in essence a social prescriber’s role is to address the social determinants of health (ORCHID 2021). This can cover issues ranging from finances and unemployment, housing issues, low mood, anxiety and lower-level mental health, loneliness and social isolation to specific long-term condition support and peer support groups. To achieve the above, SP schemes need effective partnerships with the voluntary sector and both NHS and non-NHS providers.
Collaboration that improves health literacy or the ability to self-manage health and well-being for individuals and communities could be said to lie at the heart of social prescribing outcomes. Communities with appropriate resources and health promoting assets are required. Currently there is little research on the impact of social prescribing on the voluntary sector and how to grow these resources from a community-led perspective with a direct link to SP outcomes.
This study essentially attempts to explore through a systems approach:
1.What do SP collaborative communities look like?2.Can social prescribing help foster healthy communities, while impacting on individual service users and improving non-clinical health outcomes?
This study will take a mixed methods explanatory design, with a focus on the following 3 core components:
1. Explore the impact of social prescribing community prescriptions for the service user (SU) and the SU’s interaction with the Voluntary Community and Social Enterprise Sector, (VCSE) which social prescribing relies upon to be effective in its aims.2. Explore the role of the link worker hosting organisation in enabling collaborative communities and fostering trust between health professionals and community providers (how is this best achieved?).
3. Obtain a systems overview with input from commissioners and Primary Care Network Managers on what collaboration looks like in terms of a successful Social Prescribing scheme.
REC name
Wales REC 1
REC reference
23/WA/0110
Date of REC Opinion
11 Apr 2023
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion