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Central Highlands Association of Neighbourhood Houses

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Wellbeing Scripts Insights

Wellbeing Scripts: The Beginning

Posted on July 14, 2020June 6, 2022 By Jane Grimwood
Wellbeing Scripts: The Beginning
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Follow us on www.linkedin.com/showcase/wellbeing-scripts-system-building

OR www.facebook.com/WellbeingScriptsSystemBuilding

Imagine if we could reduce the pressure on health services by 20%, whilst increasing the resilience and health of people in our communities, creating better places to live.

The evidence is in – it is possible. By creating stronger links and pathways between health practitioners and community we improve our framework for wellbeing, supporting medical interventions as well as social connection- both essential in wellness. Our approach draws on the fundamentals of Social Prescription – people, opportunity and trust, to build a fit-for-purpose Australian model from the ground up.

‘Social Prescription’ is a system where doctors can refer people to community activities, reducing the strain on the medical system and improving medical results for people. Developed in the U.K., Social Prescription started out as a simple place-based approach to health- connecting people through community, to support health and wellbeing. Over the past three decades it has become a complex and internationally recognised system with real and meaningful success.

In early 2020 CHANH met with Health Futures Australia and the Ballarat Subdivision of the Australian Medical Association to develop the concept of Wellbeing Scripts – our ‘take’ on Social Prescription, or, how we might develop Social Prescription in a regional, Australian setting.

In June 2020 we were successfully funded by the Australian Government to begin prototyping and raising awareness of the value of social connection for wellbeing.

More than $3.7M of Social Connections value to Central Highlands region

Posted on June 26, 2023June 26, 2023 By Jane Grimwood No Comments on More than $3.7M of Social Connections value to Central Highlands region
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Neighbourhood Houses across the Central Highlands region continue to do incredible work in creating social connections opportunities – Walking Groups in Clunes, Chatty Cafes and Community Lunches in Ballarat, Mending Days in Darley… to name a just a few. (It would be challenging to name them all!)

In fact, the social connections value of the 14 Neighbourhood Houses in our region is staggering – the 2022 Department of Families, Fairness and Housing Evaluation Survey conducted by Neighbourhood Houses Victoria tallied the combined value of Central Highlands Neighbourhood Houses for ‘Improved quality of life through social connection’ at $3,705,700.

And that’s just what we can measure – the real impact is would be significantly higher.

Our Wellbeing Scripts Systems Building Project wound up 6 months ago, but that same survey also demonstrates Wellbeing Scripts did it’s job – with an average of 14 social prescription known referrals received by Neighbourhood Houses each month. Anecdotally, this hasn’t dropped off in 2023 – if anything, Neighbourhood House Managers report this number is increasing.

So, if you have not yet signed up to your local neighbourhood house newsletter or social media page – now is the time to do it. Better yet, make time to visit, or arrange a time to discuss the health and wellbeing opportunities your local neighbourhood house can offer your patients in your clinic.

That’s a wrap for the first stage of Wellbeing Scripts in Central Victoria

Posted on August 4, 2022August 4, 2022 By Jane Grimwood 2 Comments on That’s a wrap for the first stage of Wellbeing Scripts in Central Victoria
That’s a wrap for the first stage of Wellbeing Scripts in Central Victoria
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“I think wellbeing grabbed my attention, which I think is really exciting”, General Practitioner.

A global pandemic that keeps on evolving, the closure of Neighbourhood Houses from being the open centres that they are, and an unbelievably stretched primary care sector hasn’t stopped this two-year project in laying the foundations for a bright wellbeing future.

To recap: The Wellbeing Scripts Building Project is led by the Central Highlands Association of Neighbourhood Houses based in Ballarat covering 14 houses across the central highland’s region of Victoria. The project was funded by the Commonwealth Governments Men’s and Women’s Health Chronic Disease Prevention Program for a two-year period 2020 to 2022.

The purpose of the project was to prototype and test a ‘light’ social prescribing approach between General Practitioners (GPs)/Health Practitioners and Neighbourhood Houses (NH). In a nutshell, this was about awareness raising of NHs and the valuable range of services and programs they offer for everyone in the community and creating an awareness for GPs of these services, and developing a simple referral mechanism/s. This is ‘light’ social prescribing, the signposting of places of referral.

We employed a human-centred design methodology, genuinely open to the question of ‘how might we’ design a process that’s agile, and easy to use in connecting these two very significant services in our communities. We conducted dialogue interviews, initiation workshops, prototyping workshops, and a whole group consolidation session which brought the communities of Bacchus Marsh, Ballarat, Creswick, and Clunes together to share their prototypes and experiences in March this year.

“Previously it was more of a chat … now it’s perhaps more let’s try to find something you could do? And so, it’s perhaps just moved a bit more of a step forward”, General Practitioner.

Our intent was to design, then then test these ideas in practice.

Neighbourhood Houses remained closed most of 2021, our most critical year for implementation. This meant that the range of socially connecting services and programs were not provided, those we had hope would be ‘referred’ to by GPs. Instead, we used the project time to develop a range of tools to assist GPs in referring to Neighbourhood Houses, available on www.chanh.org.au/wellbeingscripts. These include:

  • short introductory film resources;
  • localised referral templates for general practices to download and apply to their practice; and,
  • a clinic poster with a QR code for health practioners.

Now what? We have recently undertaken some dialogue interviews with GP participants, dialogue interview in style to check-in on project learning, insights now on social prescribing and what the Wellbeing Scripts project might look like in the future.

“So, I think that that was sort of really useful in terms of doing the workshopping and the really sort of thinking through how you know how to access and understanding the neighbourhood house, yeah definitely just increased my awareness of that I was able to take back to the practice and we used the posters”, General Practitioner.

“The neighbourhood house has activities refer them to, but it’s about how do you actually really support people to socialize them into groups, learn how to join groups”, General Practitioner.

Now that NHs are open and offering comprehensive calendars of activities in each community this is the opportunity to refresh and boost the project by encouraging the use of the tools and templates for referral and to track this process of referral. This is the opportunity we missed due to COVID. One way to do this is our 2-minute video which guides health practitioners through ‘how to’ download and adapt a Wellbeing Script for their practice. Simple, practical, and ready for use.

What’s next? We are super excited that the Western Primary Health Network has funded a phase 2 for Wellbeing Scripts. This project is running through to September 2022 with the aim of further in-depth interviews and distilling the insights to shape a “Wellbeing Script: Framework for the Future”.  This phase introduces a second cohort of GPs, practice nurses, and psychologists into shaping how a Wellbeing Script could suit their practice, and how the scaling of a Wellbeing Script approach would work for general practice uptake.  

Pathways to Health and Wellbeing

Posted on March 8, 2022June 6, 2022 By Jane Grimwood
Uncategorized

The opportunities for community-based activities were pretty slim on the ground in 2021 – and yet every single Neighbourhood House across the Central Highlands region found ways to keep connections – whether deliverying online programs, making phone calls or rolling ou programs face to face when the opportunity presented (in fact, in August 2021, in the midst of lockdown changes. over 4 days, the 14 neighbourhood houses in the Central Highlands delivered an amazing $113,443* of commuity value).

Once such program was born of the connection between the local neighbourhood house manager, a GP and an endocrinologist in Clunes – a group-based lifestyle modification program entitled “Weight Off My Shoulders.” WSSB was lucky enough to partner with this incredible team to explore the value and benefit of working together in this short film – what happens for people when health practitioners and neighbourhood houses team up. Inspired much?

*As measured by the Department of Families Fairness and Housing, and analysed by Neighbourhood Houses Victoria.

Finalists in the 2021 Victorian Health Promotion Awards!

Posted on December 9, 2021June 6, 2022 By Jane Grimwood
Uncategorized

We are thrilled to be announced as a finalist for the Building Back Better Category in the 2021 Victorian Health Promotion Awards. 

We’re incredibly proud to have been recognised amongst the many extraordinary organisations making a vital difference to the health and wellbeing of our community. 

Our complete admiration to the doctors and neighbourhood house staff, and to our partner Health Futures Australia, who have all collaborated with such dedication and creativity in this wonderful initiative!

Why are we going “light” on social prescribing?

Posted on July 22, 2021June 6, 2022 By Jane Grimwood
Why are we going “light” on social prescribing?
Uncategorized

We are often asked in the Wellbeing Scripts project as to why we use the term ‘light’ social prescribing rather than just social prescribing. We have been guided by Kimberlee’s (2015) analysis of a range of existing programs which identified four levels of social prescription: Signposting; and Social Prescribing Light, Medium and Holistic.

Our ‘why’ for a focus on signposting and ‘social prescribing ‘light’, sees a combination of provision of information to patients and community members, and referral between General practice and Neighbourhood Houses (potentially in both directions). Further:

  • It is human-centred in design – created by the people using the system for their context, purpose, and community need
  • It is sustainable – taps into and uses existing capacity and capability, does not require us to spend all our time seeking funding, then more funding
  • Is a ‘Value add’ relationship– there is great value for GPs and Houses in connecting and referring for their community
  • It further unlocks mutual benefit – at a time of great need to socially connect people
  • It is asset based – we go with the energy in the system for greatest likelihood of change and uptake
  • Is place-generated and created – fit for purpose for that community and that GP and NH relationship
  • It has potential for growth – we can learn and iterate, creating solutions that meet the actual needs and opportunities at hand 

As Nicole Battle, CEO Neighbourhood Houses Victoria, puts it “Wellbeing Scripts can be mutualistic with the Neighbourhood Houses being able to refer patients to GPs”. 

Put simply we do not want to get too caught up in the enormous size of the effort and resourcing required to shift the health care system to social prescription. This takes time and resources. So how might we contribute to this holistic system as it emerges? We aim to demonstrate how bespoke scripts can be developed and used for everyone’s benefit, we do not see the need to wait- rather, we intend for our regions Wellbeing Script to compliment and inform.

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Your Neighbourhood Houses:

Ballan and District Community House

Ballarat Neighbourhood Centre

Ballarat East Neighbourhood House

Ballarat North Neighbourhood Centre

Beaufort Community House and Learning Centre

Clunes Neighbourhood House

Creswick Neighbourhood Centre

Darley Neighbourhood House

Daylesford Neighbourhood Centre

Haddon Community Learning Centre

Laurels Education and Training, Bacchus Marsh

Meredith Community Centre

Trentham Neighbourhood Centre

Wendouree Neighbourhood House

Got feedback? We’d love to know Your Three Words

Contact

Phone: 0428 325 926

Email: networker@chanh.org.au

Address
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Tuppen Drive, Sebastopol 3356

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