Welcome to the January Network Newsletter!

Happy 2023 to you all! I hope you had a lovely break over the festive season.

The Newsletter brings together news, stories and events which we hope will be of interest to the Network.

In this month's edition we have a case study from one of our Forth Valley CLWs and Change Mental Health's CLW newsletter from the Highlands. We also have details of how to get involved in our CLW Mapping Project and our next Network peer support event in February.

The Scottish Community Link Worker Network is the national network, developed and facilitated by VHS, for primary care community link working in Scotland. Please visit our webpage for the latest blogs, reports and information about the Network. And don't forget to follow us on Twitter @ScotCLWnetwork.

Tell us your news

Events, Workshops and Training

Community Link Worker Mapping – Online Survey

Voluntary Health Scotland and the Scottish Community Link Worker Network are currently conducting research to map the range of Community Link Worker projects across Scotland and learn more about the impact Community Link Workers have in their communities. As part of this research, we are conducting a short online survey to learn more about the experiences of CLWs working in primary care settings across Scotland.

The information you provide will help us to understand more about the delivery of CLW programmes across Scotland. It will inform VHS and SCLWN policy engagement over the next year, particularly our engagement with the Scottish Government Primary Care Directorate and the future development of link working in Scotland.

To thank you for your participation, we are also offering the chance to enter a prize draw for a £25 book token. Please click here to take part.

If you have any questions about this survey or other research, please contact:

Findlay Smith Policy and Research Officer

Roisin Hurst SCLWN Development Coordinator

Community Link Workers, Mental Health and Audit Scotland

As part of their ongoing performance audit of adult mental health services in Scotland, Audit Scotland held two online focus groups in November with CLWs from the Scottish Community Link Worker Network.

The focus groups provided the community link workers with an opportunity to share their experiences of helping people access mental health services and contribute to the ongoing improvement of adult mental health services in Scotland.

You can now read the key messages from the focus groups and findings from these will contribute to Audit Scotland’s final report which is expected to be published in June 2023. For more information about the audit please visit here

Scottish Community Link Worker Network: Knowledge Exchange Event

We held our second Knowledge Exchange Event on 19th January and listened to two excellent presentations from Kevin Duffy from the Money and Pensions Service and Kerry Knox from Families Outside.

You can view the presentations from the event here.

Please do let us know if there are organisations you would like to hear from in the future. Also if any CLWs are interested in finding out more about the Money Guiders programme from the Money and Pensions Service, which includes exclusive access to free e-learning and a new City & Guilds endorsed credential, then please contact Roisin Hurst

Scottish Community Link Worker Network: Peer Support Event, Wednesday 8th February from 2-4pm

We will be hosting our next Peer Support Event on 8th February on Zoom from 2-4pm. To support Community Link Workers’ (CLWs) wellbeing and to enable CLWs to share learning and good practice, the Scottish Community Link Worker Network is bringing together CLWs to talk about the tools and resources currently available to support their health and wellbeing. We will go into breakout groups to allow CLWs from across Scotland to chat to their peers about what works best for them.

Scottish Community Link Worker Network Annual Conference 2023

The Scottish Community Link Worker Network Annual Conference will take place on Wednesday 24th May 2023 at The Studio, Hope Street, Glasgow. This will be a fantastic opportunity for the Network to come together in-person for the first time. The Conference will be a celebration of the achievements of community link workers in supporting their communities and working alongside primary care colleagues to address health inequalities.

We are pleased to announce that the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care has agreed to be our keynote speaker. We will be working with the Network's Advisory and Working Groups to plan an interesting and thought-provoking event and bookings will be open shortly. We want CLWs to be central to the programme, so if you would like to contribute, please get in touch with Roisin

CHEX Annual Conference 2023

The CHEX Annual Conference will take place in Glasgow on 21st March. CHEX is placing a spotlight on how community-led health organisations and those tackling health equalities are working on the front line of the cost-of-living crisis.

With communities and groups coming under intense pressure, and still recovering from the impact of the pandemic, this conference will be a chance to share stories of organisations doing vital work under difficult conditions – and a place for you to share insights and ideas from your own lived experience.

CHEX want to understand the pressures organisations are facing, and give people an opportunity to share how they’re supporting people in their communities. They will also be exploring what messages to send to decision makers and asking what they need to do to support people and organisations, and make the wider changes we urgently need.

Highlights from the Network

A Community Link Worker Case Study: Justine's Blog

Justine Nicholson is a Community Link Worker within NHS Forth Valley. In Justine's blog she talks about a patient she recently supported and how the issues first presented in a referral are not always the ones that are most important to the person referred.

Change Mental Health - Community Link Worker Newsletter

Change Mental Health manage the programme of community link workers in NHS Highland. They have recently published their newsletter which has updates on what they have all been up to!

Inverclyde CLWs on Twitter

The Inverclyde Community Link Worker Team is on Twitter and is keen to reach out to other CLW programmes. You can find them at @Inverclyde_CLW Happy tweeting!

Ask for help: Orkney Community Link Practitioners

Orkney Community Link Practitioners (CLPs) have been meeting with their NHS colleagues to look at the data gathered by the CLPs and which data is needed to be fed back to funding bodies. They would be interested in finding out what tools other CLPs use when gathering baseline data at first and subsequent visits; the client base is so broad ranging that it can be tricky to find a 'one size fits all' solution.

If others were willing to share this with them, they would be really interested in chatting to find out more. Please email Erika Copland if you are willing to share information.

Other News

The Changing Room Project

SAMH, in partnership with Movember, the SPFL Trust, and, 24 community trusts associated with Scottish professional football clubs offer The Changing Room.

The Changing Room has one goal – to promote men’s mental health and wellbeing through the power of football. Men love a blether about football, but men also need to get the stuff that’s bothering them off their chest. To help, The Changing Room is here for men aged 30 – 64 who want to find out more about how they can look after themselves.

The main outcomes targeted by the 12-Week are increased social connectedness and enabling men to better self-manage their own mental health and wellbeing. The course has been very successful in delivering those, with the latest data available showing that the survey scores for participants increased for both Life Satisfaction, by 35%, and Mental Wellbeing, by 14%.

Community Trusts across Scotland are regularly recruiting participants. You can click here to find out if clubs in your area are involved, find out more about the 12-week course and see a participant’s feedback video.

Stroke Association

If it wasn’t for the Stroke Association’s telephone befriending service, ‘Here For You’, the isolation after my stroke would have been unimaginable.

Stroke is Scotland’s biggest single cause of disability. Two out of three people who have a stroke leave hospital with disabilities. These can be life-changing.

As a charity working solely on stroke in Scotland, their focus is to provide support to help people rebuild their lives after stroke. In addition to their information services, including their Helpline, online community, groups and cafes, in some areas, they provide telephone support after discharge from hospital. You can read their leaflet here and you can also email the engagement team for more information.

Opportunity to contribute to PhD study into the career journey of social prescribers

Elaine Willmore, Head of Research and Development for Therapy at Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, is undertaking a PhD based around Social Prescribing. Phase One is a survey looking at the career journey that people working in Social Prescribing roles have had prior to starting their jobs, how this may have influenced or shaped their practice and how it has affected their developing sense of identity. A good response rate will provide strong data for Phase Two, so if you can find a few minutes to participate then she would be incredibly grateful. She will be sharing the results with you all so everyone can benefit from the study findings.

Leave no one behind: Health Foundation Report into Scotland's Health Inequalities

The Health Foundation has published a report on the state of health and health inequalities in Scotland since devolution. A major finding of the report is that the health of people living in the most deprived areas is being left behind the rest of society.

Health, Social Care and Sport Committee Debate: Tackling Health Inequalities in Scotland

Following the publication in September of the Committee's report into Tackling Health Inequalities, the Committee held a debate before Christmas on tackling health inequalities in Scotland. You can watch the full debate here