Page last updated: Wednesday 4 February, 2009 2:19 PM

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Teach people how to fish...

 

The introduction of 'personalisation' will happen in many local authorities throughout the UK - Direct Payments, Individual Budgets, whatever you want to call them are due to impact on the way services are provided.

There is a vision of a new social care system that helps people stay healthy and recover quickly from illness, this will be acheived through a focus on prevention, early intervention and enablement. Services for those people who require on-going care support will receive high quality, personally tailored services, services 'demanded' by disabled and older people.

These individual budgets are designed to give the individual a full understanding of the finance that is available them, to empower them to take control and make decisions about the care that they receive. Direct payments (cash) are then made to people who have been assessed and deemed to require services - these are in lieu of social service provision.

This is all very good but how well does it fit with people who have a visual impairment? The assessment as we all know, is extremely important as this will determine the need however, how the needs are met may well be decided by the knowledge of the assessor. If they have knowledge of rehabilitative services that would enable a person to regain independence they may suggest training from a professional. If the assessor's background is not in visual impairment or they have little or no knowledge of rehabilitative practice then they may consider a 'care' rather than 'training' approach.

Let's suppose a person is unable to make a meal then, as Rehabiliation Specialists, we could provide some training to meet this need. Alternatively, we could take the ' care' approach and provide the person with finances that allow them to 'employ' a person to make the meal for them. The former would obviously be more beneficial to the local authority as the financial commitment would not be 'on-going' although the initial costs may well be greater. The same scenario could be applied to orientation & mobility, would a person prefer someone to take them out a couple of times a week or would they prefer training? What would you choose?

Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.

Chinese Proverb

If the person who has lost their sight is unaware of rehabilitative intervention and more importantly, all that it involves, they are likely to choose a path of 'care' that will meet their immediate needs. You only have to count the number of times you've explained what you do in your job to quickly understand that people outside of the profession have little or probably no idea what a Rehabilitation Specialist does - why would we expect otherwise from people who have recently lost their sight? Even if by good fortune they have been told about a Rehabilitation Specialist I doubt seriously whether they will know anything about what they do or where they work.

This could have serious implications for professionals working in the field as referrals for their services may decrease - after all, why would someone ask for something they don't know exists?

 

Is your authority applying the personalisation approach? Do you have clients who are receiving rehabilitative services through direct payments? let us know your thoughts by e-mailing info@rehabworker.co.uk

 

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