A patient"s property is a huge determinant of well being and wellbeing

A number of well being troubles are brought on or exacerbated by poor living conditions, writes Faisal Majeed. Photograph: Getty Images/SuperStock RM

A single of my most significant frustrations as a GP isn’t going to relate to these troubles that constantly grab the headlines this kind of as falling funding levels or increasing workloads. It is one thing far a lot more fundamental. A patient’s house, the problem of their house, is a issue usually neglected by clinicians however it really is a huge determinant of health and wellbeing.

At my GP practice, based in a deprived region of Liverpool, a lot of patients who come via the door have housing-related well being issues. Respiratory conditions, arthritis, depression, insomnia, fractures – all are induced or exacerbated by bad living conditions.

How considerably time and cash could be saved if we invested much more assets in preventing well being problems from escalating to a point the place individuals require a lot more intensive care? Straightforward measures to tackle cold and damp properties or to give the adaptations that permit individuals to reside independently could make a large big difference.

Sub-standard housing is broadly recognised to be a main contributory element to bad overall health and we see its detrimental results every day. And nevertheless the response on the ground doesn’t appear to be modifying quick enough.

The Better Care Fund (BCF) provides a possibility to do issues in a different way, to weave collectively wellness, social care and housing assistance in a way that indicates far fewer people have to make the trip to hospital. But when regional BCF plans were submitted in April, how a lot of reflected the relevance of housing? My suspicion is relatively number of will have explicitly referenced housing assistance and nevertheless most will include strategies that can not be attained with out addressing the property setting.

In a lot of GP practices and hospitals there is tiny awareness of residence-based help and exactly where there is, referral processes are time-consuming and complicated. I function with my nearby house-improvement company by creating letters of assistance to support sufferers entry grants for adaptations. It could be as straightforward as some thing like a grab rail or perhaps assistive technologies to help a particular person with bad vision to navigate their home. But the last point I want is the burden of writing letters and producing cellphone calls to different agencies to arrive at a remedy for each patient. We need a simplified technique which allows individuals to be prescribed housing support swiftly.

I would like to see GP surgeries turn out to be hubs for accessing housing help, enabling information about the property setting and related support to be entered on to a person’s medical information so GPs can appear at the whole picture. Even though they are at their GP practice, sufferers should be ready to get information about neighborhood useful-individuals, community telecare provision, housing possibilities guidance and other relevant solutions and be in a position to guide appointments there and then.

The rewards of acquiring this sort of support frequently go way past the preliminary repair. A home improvement agency can modify a door phase and at the identical time flag up other problems this kind of as journey hazards, loneliness, bad heating or even the early indicators of dementia. By bringing this kind of provision into surgeries it joins up the dots, assisting physicians to really comprehend a person’s situation. It also frees up GPs’ time and allows us to perform with sufferers to stop troubles further down the line.

If surgeries are to perform this hub role there wants to be a shift in clinical commissioning group (CCG) perspectives. As well typically the hyperlink amongst great housing and very good health is taken as a given. This requirements to adjust. Housing support won’t get the funding precedence it deserves unless it is exclusively, not just implicitly, referenced in BCF arranging. We need to proceed to existing a robust situation for investment.

Dr Faisal Majeed is a GP at Dunstan Village Group Practice based in an inner city region of Liverpool

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A patient"s property is a huge determinant of well being and wellbeing