Support for adult social care providers

Who we work with

Our Supporting the Provider Market Team works with:

• local providers delivering adult social care services
• providers or services linked to hospital discharge or admission avoidance

How we can help

We can offer a range of support:

• recruitment and retention: support to help you address any challenges in the recruitment and retention of staff for particular geographic areas or market sectors
• staff training and development: help fill training gaps for your staff and managers to meet our strategic and operational priorities, includes issues such as hospital discharge requirements and enabling people to receive care closer to home
• proactive support: early intervention to resolve service delivery issues and avoid us having to intervene later
• technology and innovation: help to explore innovative options using the latest technology to develop services, create efficiencies and improve service delivery

The support we offer to local adult social care providers is free of charge and there is currently no charge for training courses.

If you would like support in any of these areas please Contact Supporting the provider market.

Support for preventing falls

We work with adult social care providers in a number of different areas including falls prevention, which is linked to the countywide falls strategy. There are a number of resources available for service users/residents and their families and for professionals/ providers.

Resources useful for you to share with your service users/residents and their families.

• We provide information for the public about falls on our Prevent slips, trips and falls page.
• Get up and go - a guide to staying steady offers useful advice on maintaining balance, exercises for improving strength plus other hints and tips. 

Resources available for professionals and providers.

• The React to falls (in care homes) website provides advice on reducing the risks of falls in your care home.
• The County Durham Care Academy - careers in social care offers falls training to local adult social care providers through the Social Care Information and Learning Service (SCILS) - see our Training and support for adult social care staff page. Free training for providers includes Falls Prevention training (care homes) and County Durham Adult Learning and Skills: Level 2 Certificate in Falls Prevention Awareness.
• National Institute for Health and Care Excellence: falls in older people - assessing risk and prevention provides guidelines that cover assessment of fall risk and interventions to prevent falls in people aged 65 and over. It aims to reduce the risk and incidence of falls and the associated distress, pain, injury, loss of confidence, loss of independence and mortality.
• Gov.uk: falls - applying All Our Health
• Stow Healthcare: The Decaf Project has useful information about the impact of switching to decaffeinated drinks and how this can affect falls prevention.

Technology funding for providers

We have been allocated Discharge funding as part of the Better Care Fund (BCF). The main purpose of the BCF Discharge funding is to provide increased investment in social care and community capacity to support discharge and free up hospital beds. The Council has made available funding for some key providers to receive up to 50% of the cost of an eMAR system to result in safe administration and recording of medications. This use of a digital record will create efficiencies in staff capacity that will support providers to accept referrals for hospital discharges and have the additional benefit of supporting providers to deliver safe care to people discharged from hospital.

The eMAR fund for OP Care Home providers has now closed. Any providers who felt they were not yet in a position to apply but are considering eMAR in the near future can contact stpm@durham.gov.uk and any future opportunities will be shared. 

Providers are reminded that there is some funding available from 'Digitising Social Care' for Digital Social Care Records. More information can be found at Digitising Social Care: Unlocking the benefits of digital in adult social care and Digitising Social Care: Funding for digital social care records – the clock is ticking!.