Quick guides to support health and social care systems

NHS England and partners have published a series of quick guides to support local health and social care systems. The guides provide practical tips, case studies and links to useful documents, which can be used to implement solutions to common issues.

The quick guides:

  • bring clarity on how best to work with the care sector
  • help you to find out how people across the country are working with the care sector to reduce unnecessary hospital admissions and delayed transfers of care
  • break down commonly held myths
  • provide access to resources to allow you to successfully implement new ways of working
  • enable you to break down barriers between health and social care organisations.

Improving hospital discharge

The discharge to assess model has been implemented since March 2020 with an intention to support more people to be discharged to their own home. Embedding the discharge to assess model will assist in continuing to reduce the length of stay for people in hospital, to improve people’s outcomes following a period of rehabilitation and recovery, and minimise the need for long-term care at the end of a person’s rehabilitation.

It is important to note that the hospital discharge quick guides that can be found below were produced prior to the implementation of the Hospital Discharge Service Policy and Operating Model (August 2020). These guides remain useful for health and care systems to use, but should be considered alongside the most recent policy and materials.

Better use of care at home

Enhancing health in care homes

Trusted Assessment

The use of a Trusted Assessor can reduce the numbers and waiting times of people awaiting discharge from hospital and help them to move from hospital back home or to another setting quickly, effectively and safely.

The guide ‘Developing trusted assessment schemes: essential elements‘ describes how hospitals, primary and community care and local councils can work together to deliver trusted assessment as a key part of the High Impact Change Model.