The Community Asset Navigator Programme
At Bolton Community and Voluntary Services we see every day how community and voluntary groups and organisations help people to take control of their own health and well-being, reduce isolation, increase physical activity, and improve emotional health and well-being.
There are over 1,500 community and voluntary sector groups in Bolton (an amazing figure!) and they all offer a range of support in a diverse range of ways to a diverse range of people.
I know from personal experience and my experience of working in the voluntary sector for over 20 years that connecting to your local community, accessing the support from these groups and volunteering can all have a positive impact on your health. In our engagement with the health and social care workforce over the last few months, it is clear that GPs and the rest of the primary care team definitely recognise the value of connecting people to the voluntary and community sector and social prescribing to their patients.
The difficulty is who does the GP socially prescribe to and how? Which groups are best for their patient? Do they have the confidence to attend? Out of those 1,561 groups which ones are in their neighbourhood? What is the quality of these groups? These questions and more have all been raised and I can completely understand why.
GPs know that social prescribing can help their patients and may often be a better solution to the concerns and conditions they present with but how would you go about finding the answers to these questions?
This is where The Community Asset Navigator Programme can help. Our team of knowledgeable and skilled navigators, seconded from voluntary sector organisations, are able to spend time one to one with the person and find the right group/service for them. They are able to give them choice and support to attend that first time which is often a barrier to connecting to their community.
As the programme is led by Bolton Community and Voluntary Services it works alongside the development and quality support offer for groups, advising on and providing training around good practice in volunteering, safeguarding, funding support, policies and procedures and much more. As part of the programme the Community Investments enable us to increase capacity in the voluntary and community sector to support these referrals and look at addressing the identified gaps.
The Community Asset Navigator Programme is here to support GPs to socially prescribe and to support people in Bolton to build their confidence, do what they enjoy doing, learn new skills and perhaps most importantly, feel supported and connected to their community. Various research has been undertaken nationally to evidence the positive impact of social prescribing. The most memorable evidence that I and the rest of the team see is the difference this is already making to the people we are working with. Talking to people about them as a person rather than their health condition, focusing on what they want to achieve and then seeing them do this is truly inspirational and the most compounding evidence for social prescribing and the Community Asset Navigator programme in Bolton.
If you are interested in finding out more about how we do things and how patients can be referred watch this short video to hear from the navigators themselves.
