Focusing on providing services to aid in social care
Part of the reason that I haven't been updating much of this blog since I regained control of slashboot.org, is because I have been focusing my attention towards developing a web site to offer services to aid in social care and support. I have some experience in being a hands-on support worker, in a residential care setting, working with people who have learning difficulties or disabilities, dementia and autism.
I now work in a technical support role for another care provider who specialise in learning disabilities. However, during my time as a support worker I recognised the fact that the time spent on administration and recording the mundane, could have been spent far more productively on actually providing hands-on support and actually spending time with the people that I was there to support.
Working in IT support, but still in the social care sector, has allowed me to see things from the other side of the fence and hear the frustrations from other support workers instead of experiencing them first hand. I've come to understand that the majority of people who provide support to those in need of it are there because they care and are usually not at home with the administrative side, especially using a computer.
As a support worker I kept thinking, this could be done so much better and more efficiently. As an IT Support technician, I know that this has to be done in a way that is usable and makes sense to people who are there because they care and are not comfortable or familiar with computers, so would rather not have it be part of their role.
For several months myself and my partner were live-in carers for a person with Down's Syndrome. We were part of a team including the person's family, a personal assistant, a broker and of course the local social services. When this arrangement started I had already created my draft specification and decided on a structure and framework for the system that became the DailyPlan web site and the environment was ideal for testing, development and refinement of the system. Parts of the team were not overly comfortable with computers, whilst others were. All users, including the person being supported, were taken into account when designing the input forms and the processes for entering, storing and retrieving information. The result is a system that is very straight forward and intuitive to use. Aesthetically very plain to provide as little distraction and need for feature search as possible, whilst being secure and providing the means for the support team and the person being supported to communicate and collaborate.
The system is currently very usable and yet still under heavy development. It is being designed to be flexible enough to be used in many facets of social care, ranging through supporting people with learning difficulties or learning disabilities, including people with down's syndrome, the physically impaired, the elderly / aged, those suffering from dementia and people with autism or any other Autistic Spectrum Disorder. Basically anybody who is in need of support to help them live a full and active life and achieve their full potential.
The system hopes to streamline a lot of the process and improve efficiency through better communication and collaboration, to enable support teams to spend more time actually supporting and interacting with the people they support. All while being easy enough to use, that they will actually want to use the system and reap the benefits of doing so. It is intended to help in the management of careplans, both PCP and additions to the PCP, risk assessments, activities and appointment planning and management, managing medication lists and many other aspects of the administrative side of social care.
With personalisation being recognised as the way forward in the provision of social care, resulting in self direction becoming a new method of choosing and paying for services through direct payment, I felt that a personalised system that the customer and their support team had direct control over was almost a pre-requisite. I appreciate that there may be other systems out there and even in the pipe-line, but it has been a goal of mine to provide such a system and to help make a difference that helps improve the delivery of social care and support. I feel that by approaching it from the points of view of both the service user as well as the support team, I could make it usable and viable as a cost effective and very useful communication and collaboration tool in social care and support.
From a technical perspective, security and integrity have been there from the ground up, whilst not interfering with the actual usage of the system. Full audit trails and accountability have been built in covering data entry and alteration as well as read-access of that data. I felt this vital in compliance, as well as safeguarding both the people being supported and the people providing that support.
I'm still working hard at it, but looking to the future. I have formed a company for when trading begins and am expanding my networks of contacts in the social care sector, including making myself known in the support brokerage networks. I genuinely want to help improve things in social care and am working hard to do so. I'm hoping to make a successful and viable business of this, to give longevity and stability to what I am trying to create.
Wish me luck?
Post a comment:
| 
| 
