Wellness Improvement Service

The length of time people who are waiting for treatment is growing rapidly and it is understood that the backlog is estimated to take up to five years to clear. This services offers opportunities to provide alternative non-medical intervention to improve people’s health & wellbeing whilst waiting for treatment.

Development of Wellness HUBs to offer alternative non-medical intervention review to patients. It will target patients who are currently on secondary care waiting lists for treatment.

The aim is to improve patient’s health outcomes while they are waiting for treatment with a long term aim of them being removed from the waiting list and or utilise patient initiated follow up.

To adapt the Population Health approach that aims to improve physical and mental health outcomes, promote wellbeing and reduce health inequalities across an entire population of Cwm Taf Morgannwg.

The long term aims of the programme:

Improve the patients’ understanding and management of their condition with a view to them feeling well enough to be removed from the waiting list

All courses will be delivered by wellness coaches who will support the patient in setting goals and enabling behaviour change.

Anticipated outcomes:

• Increased patient understanding of their condition.
• Improved health literacy.
• Reduced symptom burden.
• Less representations to the GP to request more medications for symptom management and less requests for expedite letters to secondary care.
• Patients present less to A&E for exacerbations of these long term conditions.
• Patients improved readiness for change score.
• Patient weight/waist circumference.
• Number of patients engaged with community activity opportunities- measurable.
• Positive impact on patients health and wellbeing- GAD score.
• Number of patients removed from waiting list and using Patient Initiated Follow-up.
• Improved patient experience- measured through PROMS/PREMS.
• Increase in social prescribing and use of community assets- measured through elemental.
• Collaboration and integration of Community, Primary & Third Sector Care.
• Wellness Website developed and sustained.
• Pathways agreed and developed in primary care to reduce secondary care flow.
• Patients activation levels improved.
• Integration of digital behaviour change and social prescribing tools.

 

Patient Outcomes:

We aim to see reductions in weight, BMI and waist circumference and improvements in blood pressure, stress levels and enhanced mood and wellbeing.

The attendance of patients at nutrition and physical activity opportunities with the related improvements in health.
The group and individual support aims to reduce social isolation and improve a sense of vitality and life purpose with patients feeling less defined by illness and optimistic about wellness.

It is anticipated following the interventions that patients develop a sense of empowerment about their own ability to positively affect their long term health and an enhanced motivation to share their knowledge with their family and friends.

Impact:

The aim is to reduce patients on the waiting list and reduce flow of referrals onto it, this will have an increase in patients on the PIFU and SOS pathways and so reduce secondary care waiting lists alongside phase 2 introduction in primary care will reduce flow to secondary care waiting lists.

It is expected that the website and use of digital software will make it easier for professionals to be able to offer patients a wider level of support and promote self-care.