Community equipment and housing adaptations: draft guidance

Postural Management

For people with many conditions, effectively addressing their postural management needs, is central to maximising their independence and well-being, and their potential to engage fully in everyday activities. In addition, for the person, family and carers, this supports the promotion of self-management, which is a wider driver in terms of other national strategies, both for children and adults e.g. Ready to Act, and the Framework for supporting people through Recovery and Rehabilitation during and after the COVID-19 Pandemic.

The postural management strategy, Your Posture Matters outlines a range of key ambitions to improve postural management care for people of all ages across Scotland, and specifically highlights the critical role equipment plays in meeting those aims.

Equipment has the potential to protect, preserve and improve someone's positioning; their age, the reason why they have a movement difficulty and geographical location should not be a barrier to accessing the right equipment to protect their posture.

Ambition 3, Your Posture Matters

It is therefore essential that health & social care partnerships, and their equipment services, have an aligned strategy and policy, for the provision of equipment which helps supports those ambitions.

Historically, most community equipment services have routinely provided supportive seating for postural management needs, however, far less have systematic arrangements in place for the provision of other key products which can ensure correct alignment e.g. SleepSystems. This issue requires to be addressed, and services should work with all relevant stakeholders to develop effective arrangements for the provision of this equipment.

In NHS Greater Glasgow & Clyde, Specialist Children's Services Physiotherapists have worked collaboratively with their local Community equipment service, to stock and recycle SleepSystem products and assessment kits to help streamline and standardise access to this equipment. This has brought a range of efficiencies including, reducing demand for wider ongoing service inputs and care, reducing clinical input time, improving decontamination, streamlining procurement, and promoting self-management.

This work was recognised at the national AHP awards in 2020 as an example of good practice which was features on Glasgow City's website.

Key Actions

• Health & Social Care services should have an aligned strategy and policy, for the provision of equipment which helps support the Postural Management Strategy.
• Health & Social Care services should work with all key stakeholders, and community equipment Store service providers, to develop effective arrangements for the provision of Sleepsystems and other relevant products which support effective postural management.