A transformational plan for children and young people requiring support from allied health professionals (AHPs)

Introduction

The role of allied health professionals (AHPs)

AHPs are a distinct group of health and social care practitioners^[1] who apply their expertise to diagnose, treat and rehabilitate people. They work with a range of technical and support staff to deliver direct patient care and provide rehabilitation, self-management support, enabling and health improvement interventions. 

AHPs' expertise in rehabilitation and enablement will be key to supporting the Scottish Government's 2020 Vision (currently being reviewed and revised)^[2] of everyone being able to live longer, healthier lives at home or in a homely setting.

The National Delivery Plan for AHPs in Scotland, AHPs as Agents of Change in Health and Social Care,^[3] was published in 2012. The National Delivery Plan, as it has come to be known, aims to maximise AHPs' contribution and effectiveness by:

• empowering strong professional leadership 
• enabling the development of integrated teams across health and social care services to support continuous improvement 
• developing innovative new models of care and fully utilising innovation in health technology
• creating added value beyond health and delivering excellent outcomes for all people who use services and their families and carers
• providing effective, efficient solutions to the challenges of delivering national policies within financial constraints
• strengthening partnerships with the third sector and other agencies.

The National Delivery Plan applies to all AHPs in Scotland, which is particularly important as health and social care partnerships emerge. It evolved following a process of national consultation which provided strong support for the vision and direction of travel from a wide range of stakeholders. 

One of the National Delivery Plan's key actions, Action 4.1, is that: 

AHP directors will work with AHP leads for children's services and AHP leads in social care to develop a transformational children's and young people's service plan to meet the evolving needs of this care group and to provide an equitable and sustainable national model that reflects the early years agenda and the move towards integration of health and social care.

This proposed transformational plan begins the process of achieving this action from the National Delivery Plan.

The proposed transformational plan for children and young people accessing AHP services

First, we should explain what we mean by "transformational".

There is a critical difference between a plan for change and a plan for transformation. Transformation is not simply about implementing shifts in practice. It is about identifying and carrying out a series of inter-related and interdependent initiatives designed to achieve change in the services we provide.

This transformational plan sets high-level ambitions that will impact significantly on the way services are delivered and experienced. It is underpinned by a fundamental shift in the ways AHPs working with children and young people think about themselves as practitioners, their relationships with children and young people, parents, carers, families and stakeholders, and their current and historical ways of designing and delivering services.

Making this transformational plan a reality for AHPs working with children and young people will require them to be dissatisfied with the ways things are now, commit to culture change and accept that the way things are and have been is no longer acceptable.

Quality and innovative practice is already happening in AHP services for children and young people in Scotland, but levels of inequality of access to services and variability in decision-making in relation to prioritisation and capacity allocation also exist. The proposed transformational plan sets out to deliver the triple aim included in the Route Map to the 2020 Vision for Health and Social Care^[4] of increasing population health, improving individual care and reducing costs through improvement. These aims are key to the ambitions of the plan and the measures required to create change.

This consultation

This consultation document has evolved through a process of engagement involving AHP leads in the AHP Children and Young People's Forum, children and young people, parents, carers and families all of whom have actively participated in the development of the ambitions. A consultation by Children in Scotland^[5] in 2014 culminated in a report based on the views of children and young people, their parents, carers and families: the recommendations and highlights from this report are embedded throughout the proposed plan and are directly linked to each of the ambitions.

What has emerged is, we believe, a transformational plan that presents a bold vision for services that will meet the needs of children and young people. The proposed plan is truly transformational in that it requires leaders and practitioners to transform the way services are designed and delivered.

The process of engagement will continue and extend to a broad range of key stakeholders and groups during the consultation period, which will run until 30 October 2015.

There has been general consensus among key stakeholders that the broad direction of the plan is right, but we want to consult further on:

• the plan's overall structure and approach;
• the five ambitions − are they sufficiently ambitious, are they achievable, and are there any significant gaps that need to be addressed?
• prioritisation to support local implementation.

Responding to this consultation

We are inviting written responses to this consultation by 30 October 2015.

Please send your response with the completed Respondent Information Form (see "Handling your Response" below) to:
CNOPPPAdmin@scotland.gsi.gov.uk

or by post to:

If you have any queries, please contact Julie Townsend on 0131 244 3739. 

This consultation, and all other Scottish Government consultation exercises, can be viewed online on the consultation web pages of the Scottish Government website at: http://www.scotland.gov.uk/consultations

Handling your response

We need to know how you wish your response to be handled, and, in particular, whether you are happy for your response to be made public. Please complete and return the Respondent Information Form which is attached as an annex to this paper as this will ensure that we treat your response appropriately. If you ask for your response not to be published we will regard it as confidential, and we will treat it accordingly.

All respondents should be aware that the Scottish Government is subject to the provisions of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 and would have to consider any request made to it under the Act for information relating to responses made to this consultation.

Where respondents have given permission for their responses to be made public and after we have checked that they contain no potentially defamatory material, responses will be made available to the public in the Scottish Government Library (see attached Respondent Information Form). These will be made available to the public in the Scottish Government Library by 31 December 2015.  You can make arrangements to view responses by contacting the library on 0131 244 4556. Responses can be copied and sent to you, but a charge may be made for this service.

What happens next?

Following the closing date, all responses will be analysed and considered along with any other available evidence to help us to reach a decision on the content of the final Transformational Plan for Children and Young People, which will be published in December 2015.