Person-centred approaches

The Christie Commission report highlighted personalisation as an aspect of the asset based approach, pointing to evidence that personalisation is effective in meeting service users’ needs more directly, through peer support and access to high quality information and advice.

We are beginning to see a greater shift towards more ‘person-centred’ public services. For example, the NHS is focused on ‘personalised care’ in an effort to empower people to make decisions about their health and wellbeing.

The benefits of a more person-centred approach in healthcare include:

·        Better outcomes for patients: a patient-centred care system improves patient mental and physical health and wellbeing, including improved clinical outcomes and improvements in people’s confidence to self-manage as well as their wider wellbeing and quality of life. Person-centred approaches have been shown to increase people’s self-efficacy and confidence to manage their health and care, improve health outcomes and experience, and reduce social isolation and loneliness.

·        Financial sustainability, including reducing demand on formal, particularly acute health services, as well as achieving savings for local authority care budgets. Person- and community-centred approaches can impact how people use health and care services and can lead to reduced demand on services, particularly emergency admissions and A&E visits, freeing up staff time.

·        Wider social value, including more resilient communities and greater social connections as well as wider societal benefits from supporting people to return to work and reducing demand on other public services. Person- and community-centred approaches can lead to a wide range of social outcomes, from improving employment prospects and school attendance to increasing volunteering. They may also contribute to reducing health inequalities for individuals and communities.