Effective Interagency working in Healthcare Health, Medicine Essay

“Drawing on relevant evidence, critically examine how improved inter-agency working could enhance person-centred care* for vulnerable people”
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Over the past few decades, there has been a growing concern for policies that promote collaborative or interagency working for health and social care across UK and other regions. These policies have been influenced by various drivers such as to meet the increasing demand, healthcare costs reduction and improve the effectiveness of the healthcare system. Policies and practice strategies that address these drive factors provide for multi-agency collaboration also referred to as inter-agency working. Various scholars have defined interagency working in different ways. Hodges, Nesman & Hernandez (1999) defined interagency working as “the process of agencies and families joining together for the purpose of interdependent problem solving that focuses on improving services to children and families” (p.8). Linden (2002) stated that “collaboration occurs when people from different organizations, produce something through joint effort, resources, and decision making, and share ownership of the final product or service” (p.7). From these earlier definitions, it can be concluded that interagency working is when two parties (local, private, public) join their resources in order to address the needs of a particular needs. Due to dynamic changes in lifestyle, governments and private sectors have developed interagency working programmes in order to address these changes in the society.
Evaluations of these programmes have provided mixed results where some demonstrate improved outcomes while others claim that these improvements are small and non-significant. On the other hand, although some have identified significant cost reductions, others have demonstrated a complex image. These results have led to other studies that have attempted to establish barriers to effective interagency working and factors that promote effective integration.
In Scotland, various policies have been developed to promote interagency working in health and social care. For the past few decades, a number of policies have been implemented to ensure effective integration of health and social care. In the 1980s and 90s, the Scottish healthcare system was criticised due to increased demand and costs demanding for joined up services to address the raised concerns. Towards the end of the 1990s, the arguments shifted to the need for quicker and better decision making, reduction of the existing gaps and improvement of the quality of service. Due to these demands, various structures and systems were created in Scotland to promote interagency working. In 2002, the Community Care and Health Act was implemented to enable NHS Boards and local authorities to work together. In 2003, another Act (Local Government Act) was implemented introducing Community Planning Partnerships (CPPs) and the National Health Service Reform Act in 2004. This paper reviews the available literature to demonstrate how interagency working can improve person-centred care on elderly people to reduce falls both in hospital facilities and homes.
The number of falls in the elderly has become a primary public health concern in the modern society due to its impacts not only to the victims but also to the community at large. Recurrent falls are the cause of the increased mortality, morbidity, and hospitalisation rates in the country. Additionally, they have become the major cause of accident related deaths among the elderly. Falls have become a major problem among the ageing population with chronic conditions such as dementia, diabetes and cancer. In Scotland, falls in the elderly people account for more than 18,000 unplanned hospital admissions. Hospitals stays for fall victims exceed those of other admissions of the same group of patients. Falls have significant impacts such fractures, leading to additional medical costs. The post-fall syndrome in collaboration with other conditions such as anxiety, depression, and loss of confidence makes many to be unable to carry out their daily activities leading to social isolation.
Falls can be avoidable consequences of old age because the risks of falling depend on complex interaction of various factors such as lifestyle choices, and the environment. Appropriate evidence-based interventions and approaches can help in preventing these falls in the society. Recognition and modification of risk factors is essential in preventing these falls and its consequences. In most cases, early identification and timely interventions helps in preventing falls improving health outcomes and retaining independence in the older population. However, research suggests that no single discipline can address this alone hence the need for interagency working (Matziou et al., 2014).
Engaging in interagency collaboration is challenging for agencies that address various issues especially in acute care institutions for various reasons such as rapid changes in health status, size of health care team, and hectic pace. Additionally, in communities where team members work and travel in isolation from one client to another in order to provide direct person-centred care, they also face challenging challenges as well. It is in the field where health care providers encounter the most and complex challenging patients (older adults). However, these patients are equally complex to handle even when they are in health care facilities.
Older adults are a vulnerable population of their chronic conditions thus requiring a collaborative approach to care since one agency cannot be able to establish and address their needs and the risk factors of falling. Due to this fact, care needs to be organized and coordinated among the involved agencies across all settings. For the collaboration to be effective and realize its objectives, the involved agencies must take time to develop their framework to ensure that every member understands the role they are playing as well as those of others and they have a common goal. Most importantly, the objective of interagency working is to ensure that patient outcomes are improved.
Scholars have demonstrated that interagency collaboration promotes efficiency and effectiveness in health care delivery. The reasons given for an integrated approach of patient care are related to client satisfaction, efficiency, effectiveness and quality of care (Trivedi et al., 2013). Additionally, it has been argued that this approach does not only benefit the patients but also the involved agencies. The benefits include improved communication among the agencies, well defined roles and responsibilities, shared vision and effective collaboration of plans. Other scholars have asserted that interagency collaboration results in improved efficiency and effectiveness, ensures continuity and coordination of services as well as no duplication of services and wastage of resources.
However, the effectiveness of an interagency working depends on several factors. First, the involved agencies must demonstrate high-level of collaboration and communication. Second, they must share a common vision of finding solutions to the patients’ needs. Third, have mutual respect for each other. Finally, shared decision-making and knowledge in an open environment.