ANGUSalive is the culture, sport and leisure trust for the county of Angus in Scotland, which manages seven sports and leisure centres. Health & Wellbeing Co-ordinator Veronica Hubbard joined ANGUSalive last June.
Her role came about through funding from the Angus Prevention & Proactive Care Programme, as part of reshaping the Be Active. Live Well programme. This programme is a shared initiative between ANGUSalive, Angus Council and the Angus Health & Social Care Partnership.
Part of the Health & Wellbeing team, Hubbard focuses on how ANGUSalive can help people with the prevention and management of long-term health conditions.
“ANGUSalive covers a large area, in a relatively rural setting – this meant referral pathways were spread out, making it difficult to streamline the service,” says Hubbard. “We have one exercise referral programme, Be Active … Live Well.
The programme has two tiers: Active Start and Stay Active. When I joined, data collection for our exercise referral programme was minimal and there was very little evidence to prove our worth, despite us having a great offering.”
Part of Hubbard’s role was to align ANGUSalive’s exercise referral scheme with the new Scottish Physical Activity Referral Standards (PARS) and evidence the schemes’ impact. Easy access to data for analysis was fundamental to the team’s success.
Time management and team efficiency
“I had previously worked with ReferAll so I was very keen to bring their software to ANGUSalive,” says Hubbard. “The benefits go far beyond just data. Naturally, we use ReferAll’s software system to collect participant data and evidence our schemes more efficiently, and the quality of the data we collect is better, too. But we also use it for staff time management and team efficiency. Being able to use ReferAll to send out questionnaires and during consultations has a massive impact on how the team uses their hours, which is especially critical for our three funded posts, including my own.”
One unexpected benefit for ANGUSalive was a greater insight into the take up of services offered in its vast catchment area. “We can see where our referrals are coming from geographically and so establish where we need to focus our attention on raising awareness and better engaging partners,” says Hubbard.
“In terms of onboarding us into the system, our needs evolved, and ReferAll were very adaptable. We had some delays with data sharing due to cross-sector working agreements, but ReferAll helped immensely by giving us adapted access to the system. This meant my team could get on with system training and onboarding our participants, while we waited for sign-off on pushing our relaunch live.”
Reporting advantages and evidencing impact
ANGUSalive has implemented an online referral form, and Hubbard reports a vast improvement in the amount and quality of information her team now receives. “Participants have more time to consider what they share and are not put on the spot during a consultation,” she says. “The presets also prompt people to think about their conditions, medicines they take and reasons for referral, so we have a much clearer picture before we even meet them.
“ReferAll has made the job of collating and analysing evidence so much simpler, too” adds Hubbard. “As well as helping us pitch for future funding, we use the evidence it collates to justify funding we’ve already received and show partners how it’s been used."
“Having different levels of reporting makes a huge difference to our time. Where previously we would have been analysing data for days, now it can be done in a few hours.”
ANGUSalive’s current funding expires in March 2025 and Hubbard will be using ReferAll to help evidence successes made so far and justify expansion of the exercise referral programme. “It’s not just the evidence. Showing we have a robust system in place is equally key when going for future funding,” she says.
“We launched the online referral form in March 2024, and we can already see that the number of referrals we receive has increased by almost 50% across the board. Our initial participants are about halfway through their schemes, so we’ll soon be able to assess aspects such as how many finished and gain further insight into the varied outcomes of our interventions.”
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