Why not reablement?

Did you know that 73% of people who access reablement services are able to live independently afterwards without formal support?

Our ambition is to enable as many people as possible who would benefit from reablement to access the service, at the earliest possible opportunity.

That’s why we’re expanding our Community Reablement Service (CRS) to support more people to live independently in their home for longer.

 How is the service changing?

• We have commissioned a new and improved service which starts on 1 April 2025
  with Essex Cares Limited (ECL).
• We have almost doubled the capacity within the service, which means that more people can benefit from the service, and we can reable more people to be as independent as possible.
• We are expanding our Regaining Independence Service (RIS) occupational therapy team, who work in close partnership with ECL to provide the best reablement for people . Find out about our latest recruitment opportunities.
• WSCC and ECL are working as one team, to achieve the same goals for West Sussex customers and we need to ensure that skills are used appropriately to maximise impact. Our ECL colleagues (including Trusted Assessors) have the capabilities to work with the majority of people and our RIS practitioners hold specialist skills which we need to target on those customers with complex needs.
• We have broadened the criteria (see below) to enable more people to be able to access the service - it’s not just for people who were recently discharged from hospital. We want to include people in the community who may otherwise need some form of ongoing support, this includes those with learning disabilities or mental health needs as well as older people.
• We are streamlining the referral processes and producing new practice guidance to enable staff to think Why Not Reablement?

What do you need to do differently?

• Make use of this excellent opportunity to refer people to our new and improved service and help us to keep as many people as possible independent for longer. It may not have been the right option at an earlier stage in a person’s journey, but please reconsider… Why Not Reablement?
  
  
• Make sure you have seen the new criteria below which enables more people to access the benefits of reablement.

Who can benefit from reablement?

People who could benefit from reablement may have a varying range of care, behavioural, communication, mobility and/or support needs relating to older age, physical disabilities, acquired brain injury, neurological conditions, mental health, learning disabilities or long-term conditions. They may also have an existing care package which could be reduced through rightsizing.

People who can be referred must:

• be aged 18 years old or over
• be resident in West Sussex
• have a primary social care reabling need, medically fit and not require nursing support
• have a cognitive capacity to consent and engage with a reablement programme as assessed
• be individuals who are not at the “end of life” care stage i.e. not within an expected final four weeks of life.

People who cannot be referred are those who:

• fall outside of the above criteria
• pose a risk to themselves or the service provider’s staff team, which cannot be managed
• because of irreparable poor cognition, are unable to retain the necessary information to engage with the reablement programme as assessed or do not possess capacity to consent
• have no recourse to public funds
• require overnight care (this cannot be provided by the service).

Everyone should be referred to reablement apart from for the reasons above.  So please think… Why not reablement?