A Comprehensive Report: Partnership Working in Health and Social Care

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of partnership working in health and social care. It begins by defining the concept and exploring various models of partnership, including unified, coordinated, coalition, and hybrid models. The report then reviews key legislation such as the Health Act 1999 and the Community Care Act 1990, highlighting their impact on collaborative working. It examines how differences in working practices and policies can affect collaboration, leading to inter-organizational conflicts and challenges. The report further investigates the possible outcomes of partnership working for service users, professionals, and organizations, detailing both positive and negative impacts. Finally, it identifies potential barriers to partnership working, such as poor communication and differences in employment policies. The report concludes by emphasizing the importance of effective partnership working for improving the efficiency and quality of health and social care services.

Working in Partnership in Health and Social Care

Table of Contents
TASK 1 GROUP PRESENTATION.........................................................................................1
TASK 2 REPORT WRITING....................................................................................................1
Introduction............................................................................................................................1
2.1 Analyse the models of partnership...................................................................................1
2.2 Review of current legislation and organizational practices for partnership working in
health and social care..............................................................................................................2
2.3 Explain how differences in working practices and policies affect collaborative working
................................................................................................................................................3
CONCLUSION..........................................................................................................................4
TASK 3 INFORMATION PACK..............................................................................................5
3.1 Possible outcomes of partnership working for users of services, professionals and
organizations...........................................................................................................................5
3.2 Potential barriers to partnership working in health and social care services....................6
REFERENCES...........................................................................................................................8

TASK 1 GROUP PRESENTATION
TASK 2 REPORT WRITING
Title: Together we are stronger
Introduction
Working in partnership refers to collaboration of two or more individuals,
governments, agencies or organizations to work together with shared interests. In this report,
different philosophies and concept of working in partnership in the health and social sector
has been discussed. This paper will discuss positive and negative effects of different users of
health services, including lack of collaboration between NHS and health care organizations.
Also the partnership between experts in different medical fields, social care and inter-
organizations will be evaluated. A critical investigation will help to explore a strategic
method of resolving the present pitfalls which are encountered on operational basis in health
and social care organization.
2.1 Analyse the models of partnership
Health and social care service provider must work with different organizations in order
to provide safe, effective, compassionate and high quality care to patients. Therefore they put
in place joint working agreement (JWA) to set out working terms and conditions and shared
objective. Such agreements can be of many forms like – MoUs, joint working protocols and
information sharing agreements with different government departments and other institutions.
Apart from this, central government also make local area agreement (LAA) with local
organizations through its Local Strategic Partnership (Boyce, 2009). LAA sets out a list of
improvement targets which local organisations commits to achieve along with a delivery
plan. These targets are determined after a thorough discussion with all partners and also
discussed with regional Government departments. Besides, the Department for Communities
and Local Government (DCLG) defines multi area agreements (MAA) between county
councils, metropolitan district councils, government, and other partners to work together to
improve health and social care as well as local economic prosperity (Haughton and
Allmendinger, 2008, p.145).
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There are four types of models in health and social care, such as unified, coalition,
coordinated and hybrid. The unified model presents where a practice is completely integrated
with leadership and management that involves in the service delivery by several agencies.
The organisations adopting this model are not allowed for government funding as have their
own financial capabilities. The coordinated model is used for partnership that are aimed to
provide health care at low cost for patients with several social and health care needs. The
coalition model presents when agreement signed between few parties with everyone having
their own self-interests in achieving a common objective. Furthermore, the hybrid model is a
combination of all three models, which enables a health and social care to reduce the
limitations and difficulties in performance and innovations management (Boris and Klein,
2006, p.81).
2.2 Review of current legislation and organizational practices for partnership working in
health and social care
The following are the two most common organisational practices and legislation adopted in
the partnership working in social and health care:
Health Act 1999
In April 2000, the act was actually came into force. It comprises the latest effort of
pulling down the “Berlin Wall”, which divides health care provided and funded by the NHS
from the local council’s social service. The act introduced as the distinction between social
and health care is often unclear to the users of service, who find difficulties in selecting
distinct parts of their care package. There remain confusion related to who does what, i.e. if a
client is given a social bath or health bath. Such types of artificial boundaries can outcome in
lack of funding disparities and continuity of care. One more classic issue arises where the
beds of NHS are blocked by the patients who no longer require care in the hospital but whose
packages of social care have yet to be arranged due to the problems of social service funding.
The concept of working in partnership is not new but through the health act 1999, new
flexibilities have been introduced to eradicate perceived difficulties (Glasby and Dickinson,
2014). These comprise allowing local authorities and health bodies to:
o Establish pooled budgets;
o Delegate functions through integrating provision and nominating a lead commissioner;
o Transfer funds among bodies.
In addition to above, the service focus of this act has been on people with learning
disabilities, older people and mental or children health. Also, services must become far more
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designed and co-ordinated around the users. The health act 1999 will lead to savings of cost
as well. For instance, keeping an old person in a health care can cost huge expenses than the
more adequate package of social care. The act allows creation of pooled budgets by which
funds will be no longer tagged as belonging to the social and health services and managers
will be able to take holistic or sensible decisions (Raffensperger, 1999).
The Community Care Act 1990
The NHS and Community Care Act 1990 introduced several changes that create
implications for independent service providers. The legislation was aimed to lessen the
unnecessary institutionalisation, improve public and private service sectors collaboration and
enhance the non-statutory community care services demand (Filinson, 1998, p.241; Loxley,
1997). The main objectives of this act are:
 Services for patients at home and three types of services given to them including day,
respite and domiciliary;
 Domiciliary care involves home care or home help, bathing services and occupational
therapy;
 Day services comprises all daytime care outside the home, i.e. day hospitals, lunch
clubs or day centres;
 Respite services consist of day centre attendance, sitting service, respite in nursing and
residential homes (Taylor-Robinson and et.al., 2012).
According to community care act, any entity including primary healthcare team
member on behalf of a patient can make referral to social services. An assessment should be
carried out by a local authority for anyone who require the community care service (Leathard,
2004). Then a written care plan should be provided by local authority by setting out:
o The services to be given when and by whom and what will be received by offering it.
o A point of contact to deal with issues over services.
o Information on how a representative or person can request a service review being given
if any situations change.
2.3 Explain how differences in working practices and policies affect collaborative working
Policy means a law, regulation, procedure, administrative action, or voluntary practice
of governments and other institutions. In the context of public health, policy development
relates with the planning and implementation of public health law, regulations, or voluntary
practices that influence development of health system, change in health care service provider
organization, and individual behaviour in order to improve health care quality. Collaboration
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can be defined as the act of two or more entities (individuals, groups or companies) which
work together to achieve a specific purpose and undertakes the work jointly and effectively
(McKeown, Malihi-Shoja and Downe, 2011).
For example, Health and Social Care Integration Policy according to The Health and
Social Care Act 2012 sets out specific obligations for the health system and gives a duty to
NHS England, clinical commissioning groups, monitor and health and wellbeing boards to
work in collaboration for providing health and social care services for the objective of
improving the quality of services and people’s experiences of health care. Another policy for
NHS efficiency has been updated in 2015 where customers has been offered the ability to
maximise their buying power by sourcing all of their healthcare professionals through one
commercial solution (McQuaid, 2010).
However, differences in working practices and policies amongst partnering
organizations results into an increase in a number of inter-organizational conflicts. It
adversely affects the efficiency and effectiveness of delivering health and social care services
to the patients. Also, the differences in employment policies leads to recruitment of under-
skilled staff members, which increases the risk of frequent termination or failure of working
partnership. Thus, lack of proper judgement in employment policies also lead to confusion in
assigning roles and responsibilities for members of the steering group. Besides, differences in
monitoring and evaluation techniques for assessing operations of the partnerships may lead to
under achievements (Valios, 2011).
CONCLUSION
From the above paper, it can be concluded that partnership working is a complex
arrangement between different organizations and individuals that aims at improving the
operations and performances of the concerned partners. Different health and social care
professionals needs to design and develop optimum skills, as working in partnership in health
and social care is multifaceted and involves activities such as planning, employee training
and development, monitoring and evaluation of service provision as well as creation of close
relationships with users of the services. The complexity also poses various challenges for
working in partnership that needs appropriate resolutions to enjoy the benefits of working
together.
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TASK 3 INFORMATION PACK
3.1 Possible outcomes of partnership working for users of services, professionals and
organizations
The working in partnership across health and social care is considered as being at the
core of avoiding fragmentation and giving seamless care. Also, there has been a major shift in
focus towards the results that is delivered by the services, which is most recently addressed,
for England, in New Framework Outcomes for the Adult Social Care Performance
Assessment (CSCI, 2006).
Outcomes for professionals
 Professions engaged in the partnership report that they completely enjoy it and find it
stimulating and rewarding.
 For those engaged in building new approaches of working, there is the job satisfaction
element from the autonomy and creativity from the experience.
 The partnership also leads to improved level of confidence among the professionals,
improved relation with families and better relation with other professionals (Allen, 2013).
However, there might be a range of negative influences on the identities of
professionals that can rise from the partnership working in the agencies of health and social
care. The new roles expansion within a team can result in confusion about roles within
members. Therefore, the demarcation of role is a great challenge of partnership working in
health and social care (Cameron and et.al., 2014).
Overcomes for the service users
 It has been identified by assessing the multi-agency working that the service users are able
to access more services through the partnership working.
 Appropriate access to services have a more early/preventative intervention focus. For the
service users, one of the influences is gaining access to the services that are not previously
available and easy to access. It has been also found out by studying the multi-agency
working that the function of ‘key worker’ in such agency is specifically instrumental in
bringing improved service access (Dickinson and Glasby, 2010).
 Less stigma attached to service access.
 A positive influence on the identities of professionals, as members feel more accountable.
For instance, in a multi-agency team meeting, if any person commit to perform a particular
activity then they definitely do that (Rummery and Coleman, 2003).
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Besides above, the communication is a basic platform on which interaction of
partnership takes place. A poor communication can impact negatively the functioning of
partnership in several ways, such as:
o Can leave individuals feeling overwhelmed;
o Confused or left out;
o Can increase the accountability issue;
o Can lessen a partnership’s capacity for synergy and exchange (Evans and Killoran,
2000).
Outcomes for the organisations
The partnership working can benefit the organisations in the form of reduced operations
costs. When the two firm work as partners, the operations total costs may be divided and
shared among the organisations. In this manner, the organisations can utilise expensive
medical equipment’s and tools as well as use the available space for additional services and
provide better plus advanced care to patients. This would benefit the organisations along with
its staffs to get more income and rewards.
However, the partnership means increased number of nursing staffs, doctors and carers
and high work load that require huge cost of management to supervise the overall
performance of health and social care unit. Moreover, the partnership leads to the merger of
employees working in two different environment and culture and thus, their regular control
and monitoring is needed to be done that would be time consuming.
3.2 Potential barriers to partnership working in health and social care services
Although it is presumed widely that working in partnership generally leads to
individuals or organisations increased ability to offer better services. However, there are
many challenges faced by the health and social care that work in partnership, such as:
Most of the organisations suffer with partners less understanding. Also,
misunderstanding lead to the development of biases and misconceptions within the
partnership firms. For instance, there has been a persistent misunderstanding among the
private rehabilitation centres and public correctional centres in relation to former inmates’
rehabilitation (Glasby, Dickinson and Peck, 2006).
The companies also face conflicts, which generally takes place when companies do not
build clear corporate boundaries or adequate assign responsibilities and duties to each other.
For instance, in a working partnership within non-government company and private hospital,
conflicts of interest is likely to take place if the partnering firms do lay down clearly all the
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partners responsibilities. Similarly, a conflict can arise if any partners more focuses on their
personal interests than the mutual advantages.
The firm have been also challenged with reduced commitment and reluctance of partner
firms towards the attainment of set objectives and goals. It has led to under or poor
performance of partnering firms, for instance, a social care centre that offers home to old
people may not complete attain its goals because of the reluctance to admit new people due to
the increased living cost and aging population (Holtom, 2001).
Some health and social care in partnership are reluctant to share ideas, information,
skills, knowledge and other resources that are important to achieve their objectives and goals.
It is mainly results into poor cooperation and coordination between the companies.
Moreover, at the partnership working early development stage, most of the companies
are generally reluctant to commit their appropriate time into the activities of arrangement.
Such inappropriate time allocation by the partnering firms generally results in the lagged
operations. Also, improper opportunities of training and development for employees of the
steering group has been reported as a main partnership working barrier among the health and
social care firms (Perkins, 2011).
Besides above, the several other barriers faced by companies working in partnership
include lack of proper finances, political influence, funding for adequate management,
activities coordination and other specific weaknesses like bureaucracy and corporate culture
(Leichsenring, 2004).
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REFERENCES
Online and Books
Allen, D., 2013. Working in partnership. Nursing Management, 20(5), p.39.
Boyce, T., 2009. Improving partnership working to reduce health inequalities. [Online].
Available through: <https://www.kingsfund.org.uk/publications/articles/improving-
partnership-working-reduce-health-inequalities>. [Accessed on 11 February 2017].
Glasby, J. and Dickinson, H., 2014. Partnership working in health and social care: what is
integrated care and how can we deliver it. Policy Press.
Valios, N., 2011. Expert guide to health and social care joint working. [Online]. Available
through: <http://www.communitycare.co.uk/2011/08/17/expert-guide-to-health-and-
social-care-joint-working/>. [Accessed on 12 February 2017].
Journals
Boris, E. and Klein, J., 2006. Organizing home care: Low-waged workers in the welfare
state. Politics & Society, 34(1), pp.81-108.
Cameron, A., Lart, R., Bostock, L. and Coomber, C., 2014. Factors that promote and hinder
joint and integrated working between health and social care services: a review of
research literature. Health & social care in the community, 22(3), pp.225-233.
Dickinson, H. and Glasby, J., 2010. ‘Why Partnership Working Doesn't Work’ Pitfalls,
problems and possibilities in English health and social care. Public Management
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Evans, D. and Killoran, A., 2000. Tackling health inequalities through partnership working:
learning from a realistic evaluation. Critical Public Health, 10(2), pp.125-140.
Filinson, R., 1998. The impact of the Community Care Act: views from the independent
sector. Health & social care in the community, 6(4), pp.241-250.
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Haughton, G. and Allmendinger, P., 2008. The soft spaces of local economic
development. Local Economy, 23(2), pp.138-148.
Holtom, M., 2001. The partnership imperative: joint working between social services and
health. Journal of management in medicine, 15(6), pp.430-445.
Leathard, A., 2004. Interprofessional collaboration: from policy to practice in health and
social care. Routledge.
Leichsenring, K., 2004. Developing integrated health and social care services for older
persons in Europe. International journal of integrated care, 4(3).
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McKeown, M., Malihi-Shoja, L. and Downe, S., 2011. Service user and carer involvement in
education for health and social care: Promoting partnership for health (Vol. 9). John
Wiley & Sons.
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McQuaid, R., 2010. Theory of organizational partnerships: partnership advantages,
disadvantages and success factors.
Perkins, M.J., 2011. Models of partnership working: an exploration of English NHS and
university research support offices (Doctoral dissertation, University of Bath).
Raffensperger, C., 1999. Protecting public health and the environment: implementing the
precautionary principle. Island Press.
Rummery, K. and Coleman, A., 2003. Primary health and social care services in the UK:
progress towards partnership?. Social science & medicine, 56(8), pp.1773-1782.
Taylor-Robinson, D.C., Lloyd-Williams, F., Orton, L., Moonan, M., O'Flaherty, M. and
Capewell, S., 2012. Barriers to partnership working in public health: a qualitative
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