Archive of 2019

Cordis Pulse: October 2019

October 2019

Rough sleeping is a primary focus of a number of this month’s resources. For example, Public Health England’s Health Matters explores the scale, causes and consequences of rough sleeping. It cites 2018 Rough Sleeping Statistics from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG), indicating that official estimates via street counts of the number of people rough sleeping on a single night in England fell by 2% between 2017 and 2018. MHCLG’s impact evaluation of the Rough Sleeping Initiative (RSI) 2018 suggests that this reduction might be connected to RSI funding; an analysis comparing changes in street count numbers in the 83 areas which received RSI funding to 83 areas which did not suggests the RSI led to a significant reduction in the overall number of people sleeping rough between 2017 and 2018.

A process evaluation of the RSI is due to be published in the coming months and we await its findings with interest. This will help to shed light on how the RSI has achieved or contributed to reductions in rough sleeping in areas which received funding. It also has the potential to identify learning for policies, strategies and programmes aiming to reduce rough sleeping or improve outcomes for people who experience it.

We would expect findings from the RSI process evaluation to resonate with existing research on support for people who are homeless and/or experiencing multiple disadvantage, including findings from our independent evaluations of Making Every Adult Matter and Blackpool Fulfilling Lives. For instance, existing research highlights the importance of accessible, flexible, integrated and person-centred support based on trusting relationships in engaging and supporting individuals. Crucially, the evidence to-date suggests that for reduced rough sleeping and improved outcomes to be sustained, individuals need support on a medium to long-term basis. This improved support to individuals must also be accompanied by system-level changes in areas such as strategic planning, commissioning, support pathways and workforce development. Therefore, the RSI and similar initiatives are likely to contribute to sustained reductions in rough sleeping only if they are able to facilitate the development and implementation of sustainable interventions and systems change.

Join us

October 2019

We are actively recruiting for new Consultants to join our team. Download an application pack here. 

Interventions designed to reduce and manage demand

October 2019

We have recently completed a number of evaluations concerning interventions which aim to reduce or manage demand for mainstream services. These innovations are increasingly common as health and social care services look for ways to reduce the strain they are experiencing. Having delivered a number of evaluations now, we thought it would be interesting to look across a selection of them to see if we can spot any emerging themes. In particular, we wondered:

• Are there key factors which contribute to the success of these approaches?
• How useful is the policy of investing in interventions designed to reduce or manage demand for mainstream services?

Download our blog below to find out more.

MEAM Approach evaluation: year 2 report

October 2019

This is the year 2 report for the longitudinal evaluation of the MEAM Approach, which is a non-prescriptive framework to help local areas design and deliver better coordinated services for people facing multiple disadvantage. The MEAM Approach is currently being used by cross-sector partnerships of statutory and voluntary agencies in 27 local areas across England. Our evaluation takes a mixed methods approach, in which we are collaborating with an expert research group of eight people who have lived experience of multiple disadvantage. The report presents nine early findings on the impact of the MEAM Approach on individual wellbeing for clients, on the use of resources in local areas and on local services and systems.

The MEAM Approach has been developed by the Making Every Adult Matter (MEAM) coalition, which is formed of the national charities Clinks, Homeless Link, Mind and associate member, Collective Voice.

Cordis Pulse: September 2019

September 2019

A number of resources this month focus on the impact of experiencing multiple disadvantage. For instance: Alcohol Change UK and the effect of alcohol on intimate partner violence; the Health Foundation on allostatic load, the Lancet Public Health on adverse childhood experiences; Public Health Wales and the WHO on wellbeing; and NICE on coexisting mental illness and substance misuse. This emphasis on multiple need mirrors a lot of our current work, e.g. evaluations of Making Every Adult Matter and of Fulfilling Lives programmes; and research on prevalence of adverse childhood experiences. We agree that it is important to have an ongoing focus on multiple challenges: not only because of the particularly poor outcomes experienced by this group, but also because of the challenges for providers in ensuring services are delivered in a joined-up and impactful way. Finally, a number of these reports examine resilience as well as risk. We welcome this as it ensures a focus on people’s strengths and avoids deficit models of delivery.

Whole system approaches to domestic abuse

September 2019

This literature review looks at research, evaluations and guidance to identify recommendations for designing and delivering a whole system approach to domestic abuse. This includes principles for good practice, what works, what the main challenges are and how best to overcome them. In this review, we report and distil the key findings on whole system approaches to responding to domestic abuse. We focus particularly on whole system approaches as they apply to criminal justice agencies, but the findings may also be relevant to other sectors and agencies that are seeking to improve the whole system response. Research in this area is relatively established in the domain of health and social care, but lacking in the domain of criminal justice. We therefore also integrate guidance about multi-agency working from criminal justice sources into the review.

Cordis Pulse: August 2019

August 2019

It’s been a bumper month for interesting reports: three in particular to highlight were:

• The Youth Justice Board’s (YJB) disproportionality tools outlines the extent to which BAME children are over-represented in each stage of the youth justice system.
• The Howard League for Penal Reform report on the criminalisation of children in residential care shows that some children’s homes are excessively calling the police, but efforts to reduce criminalisation are beginning to have some impact.
• The Children’s Society research on responding to children who are criminally exploited show that 14-17 year-olds are the most likely to be exploited by criminal gangs, and professionals are struggling to keep up with the scale of the problem.

Cordis Bright has recently worked with Central Government Departments, Multi-Agency Boards, Police and Crime Commissioners, Local Authority Children’s Services and Voluntary and Community Sector organisations on their responses to Serious Youth Violence and Gangs, Modern Slavery, Trafficking and Exploitation, evaluated programmes, innovations and initiatives designed to improve responses to these issues, and worked with Youth Offending Team Boards to review their work on disproportionality. Based on this experience we agree with the call from these reports for a more joined-up approach and improved sharing of information between statutory and non-statutory agencies to better support children and young people involved, or at risk of involvement, with the criminal justice system.

You can download the full version of the Pulse below.

Enablers of evidence based practice

August 2019

This report outlines the enablers of implementing evidence-based practice (EBP) in a health and social care context, and outlines some frameworks that support the implementation of EBP. This is based on our review of health and social care contexts in the UK, the USA and Australia, which explored the implementation of new innovations based on research, as well as the incorporation of research in day-to-day practice, for example, social workers learning new techniques to engage children.

It forms part of a series of literature reviews about 'what works'.

Vacancy

July 2019

Find further information and download an application pack here.

Cordis Pulse: July 2019

July 2019

This month we were pleased to see the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs report into homelessness and drug misuse. This report found that there is increased risk of problematic drug use associated with people who experience homelessness. There is a higher rate of drug-related deaths, infections among people who inject drugs, and multiple morbidities. People who experience homelessness and use substances have particularly complex circumstances and additional risks which require intensive long-term support. An integrated health, social care, and community care approach to the recovery and housing needs of people who are homeless would provide the optimal model of service delivery. This must include a focus on safe, stable housing and evidence-based harm reduction initiatives.

Our work on two major nationally important evaluations, concerning supporting people with lived experience of homelessness, substance misuse, mental health issues and offending concurs with the findings of this report. These evaluations are: (1) the national evaluation of the Making Every Adult Matter (MEAM) approach, and (2) the longitudinal evaluation of the Big Lottery Fund’s Blackpool Fulfilling Lives programme.

In these evaluations we have taken innovative, bespoke, participatory and co-productive approaches working with people with lived experience to design, conduct, analyse and disseminate findings. This month we have released a blog and podcast which covers elements of this approach. We’d recommend both to our reader.

Download the Pulse below.