Taking ALISS’ temperature

Posted on December 14, 2011 by Andy

Derek just poured the current ALISS data set into Open Heat Map and out popped a lovely picture of our current coverage. Those colourful spots show where we’ve got details of local services and resources.

Clearly there are lots of gaps to fill – this reflects the fact that we’re mostly playing with data from Grampian Care Data and Renfrewshire Libraries plus assets discovered at various events. But then part of the plan for 2012 is to get a lot more dots on the map.

So if your area is looking a little less orange than others and you’d like to remedy that then get in touch – we’d love to talk about getting your data into the Engine.

What kind of data are we interested in? Well, all kinds of things. From big lists of local services (like directories created by health boards or voluntary organisations) to one-off examples from individuals (this record points to a photo of a poster in the library).

As of this week we’ve got community cafes in EH postcodes pretty well covered thanks to additional data from our friends at the Edinburgh Food and Health Training hub.

For more examples, take a look some of the discoveries we made as a result of the recent mapping event - just the kind of thing we’re after.

 

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Cafe culture

Posted on November 23, 2011 by Andy

As Simon Youill writes in the Art of With  ‘A cup of tea is the most collaborative tool that we have’. No surprise then that ALISS meetings often take place over a cuppa, in cafes or around kitchen tables. The idea of the ALISS Engine was pretty much sketched out on the back of a cafe napkin.

So we were delighted when we noticed the development of the Edinburgh Community Cafe network – a growing band of cafes around the city providing social spaces to meet, good healthy food and whose profits go back to a community. We’ve tried a few and we’re on a mission to visit many more…

The Cafe network was one of the projects featured in the Edinburgh Food and Health Training hub showcase yesterday. The Hub provides training and information across the city, working with organ­isa­tions to deliver cook­ing classes to young carers, older people and others.

There’s more to this than a bowl of hearty soup though. When we asked people to map local assets a few weeks back many of them cited cafes and organisations that meet in them.

Quite apart from promoting healthy diets they’re hubs of community information, providing chances for people to volunteer and learn new skills. These can all play a part in self management. So, we’re wondering what lovely things we could do once we have the cafe details in ALISS along with events happening in them, how to get there, what to see if you walk from one to another….

Take a look at their map and see if there’s a cafe near you.

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Keeping connected

Posted on November 17, 2011 by Andy

We noticed, a few weeks back, that the Technology Strategy Board and Design Council were running a competition to ‘…develop innovative services that keep older adults better connected…’ and figured we knew some people who would be interested in talking more about this.

So we got together with friends who are involved in health, the arts, transport, social services and service design, for a chat over a cuppa … and some ideas started to float to the surface. Some morphed and merged. Most were filed under ‘next time’ but one in particular caught our imagination.

                                          Image: Highways Agency on Flicker

What support is out there for older people when they have to think about giving up their car? We stop driving in later life for many reasons – poor health, lack of confidence, lack of resources. But how do we ensure that we remain mobile and connected to our family, friends, places and activities when using our own car is no longer an option?

We reckon there’s potential for a service that retains, even improves, the mobility of older people when they no longer own a car. It’s called Car Freedom.

 

 

But wait, you say, what’s this all got to do with ALISS and self management?

Well, as one of the briefing documents puts it:

Being out and about is about being part of society’s
everyday norms. Being seen and seeing the
community which we are part of is important to
all of us, but might happen less regularly when
we get older. Activities out and about are often
important ways in which people feel connected.
As with people, places that we visit routinely
can provide us with a sense of belonging…

We know that having a sense of belonging – to our friends, families, communities – is important to our wellbeing. Life events can shrink our horizons, reduce our social interactions and stop us from being connected with our communities. Retaining these connections needs support in the same way that those of us living with conditions need signposting to services and people who can help us to adjust and live well.

Car Freedom could provide that support to people giving up their cars – information about local transport alternatives, local area activities, resources, people and places. Powered by the ALISS Engine, which is already collecting and indexing community assets, allowing car-giver-uppers to discover local resources and how to access them without owning a car.

And developments like this will benefit those having to give up driving due to their health condition.

It’s all very collaborative – some innovative mobility thinking from Steve and Beth at MRCMH, the wonderful service design skills of the good people at Snook and some ALISS-type thoughts thrown in by us for good measure.

It’s an example of the way we see ALISS working – acting as a platform on which others can build new services.

Exciting stuff!

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“When ALISS met IRISS”

Posted on October 27, 2011 by Andy

Back in the summer, Peter worked with Lisa Pattoni from The Institute for Research and Innovation in Social Services (IRISS),  Snook and others in Kirkintilloch to help mental health service users to map their local ‘assets’ – the things that help them to stay well day-to-day. You can read more about how we took the results, added them to the Engine and presented them nicely online.

It was a valuable exercise for all involved – we learned about how the Engine might be used, what works and what doesn’t when mapping. Importantly, the service users saw their local area and their own networks in a different (more positive) light and practitioners had a new way see the world through their patients’ eyes. Don’t just take our word for it – take a look at these wonderful videos.

So, way back when we were dreaming up a local ALISS event focussed on Edinburgh we thought it would be useful to repeat the process for service providers, giving them an insight into how this could work here … and on Tuesday, a group of 30 or so enthusiastic people from a wide range of organisations turned up at the Eric Liddell Centre to see what this was all about.

Lisa kindly joined us to share her experiences in Kirkintilloch and gave us some great insight into the benefits of mapping for the service users. You can read more about this here.

Then the fun really began when we asked participants to use similar processes to map areas of Edinburgh, adding their own ‘assets’ – community activities, organisations and resources.

We started them off with a blank canvas and lots of tools and prompts…



They soon took to it and created some amazing representations of areas that that they knew well and, through the mapping process, got to know even better!

By the time we were done the tables were packed full of pointers to outdoor spaces, weekly events, meeting places, cafes, organisations, choirs, film nights, dance classes, libraries….

…and the buzz in the room was amazing. Lots of sharing going on, leaflets and contact details being exchanged, conversations flowing … our challenge now is to try and translate these notes and pictures into digital assets in the Engine. This will help the ALISS coverage of Edinburgh resources but, of course, it’s just the tip of the iceberg. We would probably have had just as many ideas had we concentrated on a smaller area – in fact people commented that a city-wide approach was too ambitious. But then as Lisa writes:

This was just a taster session and I think we were a bit ambitious to think that we could begin to map out some of Edinburgh’s self-management resources in a little hour session. It was mostly about showing people a new approach, and giving people a method for which to start thinking about collecting the different resources that are available, as well as learning something new about the area in which they work. We came away with a wealth of knowledge and information which will give a helpful baseline for which to build on.

Exactly, it’s a helpful baseline and hopefully encouragement for others to take the ideas and processes back to base.

Using ALISS to develop new services

After a well-earned coffee break, a small group considered how they might use ALISS to address real-life problems. An example they worked on was a drug being withdrawn from use and stretching exercises being recommended as an alterative – GPs need to get this information out, particularly to older people, and it’s a challenge. Both to get the information out and also to encourage people to do the exercises. Wouldn’t it be good if ALISS could provide examples of local alternatives that would encourage stretching through community activity? walking groups or gentle chair-based exercise or maybe dancing!

As usual the creative ideas flowed and the pictures with them…I didn’t get all the details but it looks as though the service would provide GPs with access to local info ‘at the touch of a button’ and then a way of outputting this in different formats. The results could include getting people together to exercise as groups, making use of local community venues (and maybe GP surgeries?)…the result being ‘happier, healthier older people’.

A self-management network for Edinburgh?

Another group considered how we might keep the momentum of the gathering going. Is there a role for a network that keeps in touch about community activities and organisations focussing on keeping well? Of course, informal networks exist already, but it was an incredibly diverse group that had gathered on the day and the exchange of ideas and experiences was exciting. Maybe we could do more of this as well as other activities … certainly the ALISS mantra is collaborate with purpose. The mapping process had brought us together and we learned from each other by doing stuff together.

So this group wondered if there was a way to use the Engine to connect people around the city (and beyond) to do good stuff together like sharing resources and coordinating bids for funds…

They called it ALISS Springs!

So many ideas, connections, conversations and post-its squeezed into a few hours. I got the feeling there was more to do and more to be shared – but how to do so on a regular basis?

I can’t take credit for the title of this post by the way, it comes from Lisa’s rather nice tweet after our event …

Indeed it was a pleasure – thanks everyone for coming along, joining in enthusiastically and giving us so much food for thought.

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ALISS in the papers

Posted on October 13, 2011 by Andy

We got a call a while ago from the Guardian’s Healthcare Network and, after a few chats, Ben Whitelaw wrote a nice piece on what we’re up to. You can read it here.

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Mapping Edinburgh’s Self Management Resources

Posted on October 11, 2011 by Andy

We’ve all got good information about our local community – organisations, people, places and events. How can we capture this information and map these local assets? Our next event will look at how we can map the health and wellbeing resources around Edinburgh.

Come along and :

    • hear about local health and wellbeing services
    • share information about your service or project
    • help to begin building a map of Edinburgh’s health and wellbeing support
    • learn more about how you can use ALISS to help with your own information services

Everyone is welcome, particularly if you work in the voluntary sector or health service, helping people with long term conditions to live better, more independent lives.

It will be a hands-on, practical morning. We’ll show ALISS in action and then do some mapping together, discovering some new local resources and thinking about how we might use ALISS to develop new information services in the future.

There’s more information about the event here - if you’d like to come along please register there. It’s free!

The day will continue with an LTCAS members networking event at the same venue. More details here.

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Living Well @ The Library

Posted on September 14, 2011 by Andy

We spent some time in Paisley last week, talking with local people who are interested in helping to develop a new service.

Living Well @ The Library is a free, confidential service being developed and delivered by Renfrewshire Libraries and Macmillan Cancer Support. Primarily, it’ll be a walk-in service in your local (Renfrewshire) library where you can sit with a volunteer and get some help seeking information.

The service will be delivered using a site powered by ALISS, searching across all the links to good stuff that we’ve indexed, including local library collections, Renfrewshire council resources and others. We think this will beat searching lots of websites but, of course, it isn’t just about making search easier. We also think that:

  • some serendipitous discoveries might be made (if we have lots of different types of info presented in one place)
  • it could be a chance to capture the local knowledge of those using the service (eg ‘…the service I use doesn’t appear in the results… here are the details, let’s add it for others to find next time’)
  • additions from local people will help to make this a much richer, more detailed and more relevant map of support resources in Renfrewshire.

So, we’ve been working on what that site/application might look like. But we’ve also been thinking about the service from end-to-end. How will people hear about it/access it what will the consultation look like, what will they walk away with? And this is what we were exploring with service providers – including WRVS, RAMH and The Disability Resource Centre – library and information people, as well as some service users too.

It threw up interesting issues for us to work through – some for the ALISS team, some for the LW@TL team. When we’re a bit closer to some answers we’ll talk more about the service – not just because we think this will be a nice way to show how ALISS can power a new service, but also because the app will be adaptable for others who are looking to pull together disperate sources of information into one place and find good local stuff.

 

 

 

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Putting Kirkintilloch on the map

Posted on August 30, 2011 by Andy

“Yes, yes, it’s all very interesting…but, um, what is it that ALISS actually does?”

“well, you know, all those things going on locally that can help us to stay well, ALISS will help to make them more findable on the web”

“hmmm…but how?”

It’s a common question. The thing is the ALISS Engine is a platform, a starting place. Our reply is fast becoming “what do you want to do with it?”

For example:

A little while ago, Peter helped out at some workshops in Kirkintilloch, hosted by IRISS, East Dunbartonshire Council and facilitated by our friends at Snook. The aim was to get some local people together and take them through a process which would result in ‘…a visual representation of what exists to help assist positive mental health and well-being within the area that people can add to and learn from’.

There’s a really nice write up of the three workshops from the project lead Lisa Pattoni here (along with some nice pics which I’ve borrowed below)

It all went very well and highlighted a good number and variety of resources that people had identified as good local places and events – including Canal Festivals, advocacy services,  food co-ops and day care centres.

This wide range of ‘assets’ came out of conversations and scribbles. Maybe they popped into peoples’ heads when something related was mentioned or when they spotted something on the map. Sometimes this kind of discovery can happen on the web – but not often in our experience. If we had tasked the group to use the web to find ‘stuff that you know about in the local area’ we’re not sure they would have come up with such a wide range of useful resources. What words would you put into the search box after ‘kirkintilloch’?

This is where we think the ALISS engine can help. Peter took the post-its and scribbles away with him and popped the examples into the Engine. All he needed to do was search the web for the resource, add the URL and a little description and tags, including location and any dates/times, to an Engine record and hey presto it’s in.

So this

Turns into this:

 

Now, when we search the Engine for events, places and organisations in Kirkintilloch we find all this good stuff in one place.

As we keep saying, ALISS isn’t a search engine or a one-stop-shop web site that has ‘all the information you need’. It’s a place to gather and organise all these gems. It’s a big index that points people to the original source – whether it’s a web site or a poster or picture on Flickr.

So, we’re having fun with this but how can you use the Engine to store and find these gems? Well, ALISS is a platform, something to power your existing information service. Maybe you’ll want to incorporate Engine results into your own or perhaps build a new application that uses the data that’s useful to you. It might be that you’ll just want to use the data that you’ve added to the Engine yourself (so it acts your your own ‘local’ database) or maybe you’ll find stuff that others have put in there to be useful too.

The point is that once a resource is added to the Engine it’s there for everyone to make use of. Each act of search, discovery and curation is good value.

So, getting back to the Kirkintilloch collection. What shall we do with the data? For starters, one of the simplest things is to map the things we found and IRISS are looking at doing just that.

They’re using the data collected to turn this

into this

So, back to the question “…what does ALISS actually do?”

In this case, we heard about some interesting events and got involved. (Peter always describes it as ‘lending a hand’).  Three workshops and a little data input later we’re able to offer some new ways for others to use the Engine and the discoveries that came out of the exercise. And it needn’t stop there. Once the links are captured, others can use them to build their own services, maps, apps or whatever it is that they need.

So what ALISS will do is support great projects like this by indexing discoveries and joining up people who need information services (whatever they may be) with those who have the resources and skills to build them.

And, of course, outputs from this work are open-sourcey-hackable-type widgets and apps that others can use and tweak for their own use.

If you’ve got some data to share or an idea looking for some details on local organisations and events,  ALISS might be able to help to make something happen. We’ll never know unless we start having some conversations.

So, go on, what would you like to do?

(Coming up: We’re working away on a similar exercise with some friends in Renfrewshire libraries right now to develop an application that will represent  disperate local resources from a range of sources and present them in one place. In fact, we’re working with everybody involved in the processes behind it to make sure that a service is developed, not just a web page. More on that soon…)

 

 

 

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#nhss11

Posted on August 25, 2011 by Andy

I reckon we’re reaching the limits of how quickly we can run through the workshop format! During yesterday’s session at the NHS Scotland event we only had about half an hour to squeeze in some ALISS-style idea generation. But it was worth it as we got to hear some great presentations which set the scene perfectly.

In fact, as we’d walked into the event earlier in the day, Dr Harry Burns was on the big screen  talking about the importance of getting individuals and communities involved in helping to identify and develop solutions based on an assets approach.

A great chance, then, for our speakers to reflect on this with some real examples.

Jen McCole started us off talking about her work with the Long Term Conditions Alliance Scotland and the projects supported by its self management fund. Jen told us about Jean, whose husband has Parkinson’s Disease. For a long time he suffered with poor sleep but by sharing their concerns, they have inspired a programme of training and information which now helps others to understand how sleep can be affected by the condition. One of Jean’s messages is

Sometimes you need to do things differently or need some extra help, but it’s important to take charge of your own life

 

 

As Jean points out, the key to making this sort of thing happen is to work closely with everybody involved. The sleep programme provides information for patients as well as training for nurse specialists, drawing from the experiences of everybody concerned. Co-production is important if we’re to create solutions that truly work.

This was echoed by Andrew Jackson who is working with the Scottish Government’s Joint Improvement Team to ensure that community capacity building maintains a high profile in the Reshaping Care for Older People Programme. Andrew talked briefly about projects such as Shine which represents a range of initiatives to support older people to live and thrive at home in Fife. He also pointed us to a fantastic set of capacity building and co-production resources that he’s collecting.

All this talk of working together set things up nicely for Christine Hoy to quickly run through the basics of ALISS and the LINKS project that is collecting information about services and organisations immediately surrounding selected GP surgeries in Glasgow. Having found out what’s happening and what’s available around and about, LINKS information is currently going into the ALISS Engine.

As if this wasn’t enough, we then asked the unsuspecting crowd to split into groups and put their thinking hats on. It was an even shorter version of the speed-dating version we tried earlier in the summer, but good nonetheless. We prompted the groups with something to focus on – ‘people are good information sources’ or ‘helping others to understand’. We only had a few minutes for people to tell their stories at the end but some common themes emerged. There was quite a bit of talk about helping people through difficult processes. Guiding them through appointments crept up a few times as did the need for providing information (and gathering feedback) in a range of formats.

We didn’t have time to introduce each other around the groups so I’m not sure which organisations or sectors were represented – maybe that was a good thing? But I’m guessing we were doing some of that important cross-sector, partnership working co-production stuff that Jen and Andrew had talked about earlier on. There was certainly a good bit of friendly banter (and some constructive disagreement) going on.

As Peter reminded us when he summed up quickly at the end, maybe the process is as important as the ideas that come out of it.

(We’re thinking that the materials we put together might be a useful template for others looking to run a similar event.  Maybe we’ll post them here in the near future…)

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Town Hall Meeting

Posted on June 30, 2011 by Andy

Interesting things are afoot in Renfrewshire. ALISS was invited along to take part in the yesterday’s Disability Network Day at the very grand Paisley Town Hall where there was some lively discussion, great participation and some creative thinking. The event was put together by the Renfrewshire Access Panel and the Physical Disability Steering Group. It was designed to get local people together to find out what’s happening locally, to share ideas and concerns and to hear from a range of speakers.

I took part in the morning’s proceedings during which Heather Fisken, Project Manager at Independent Living in Scotland challenged us to think about what independent living really means. To quote the ILiS site, ‘…Independent living means all disabled people having the same freedom, choice, dignity and control as other citizens at home, a work and in the community. It does not necessarily mean living by yourself or fending for yourself.  It means rights to practical assistance and support to participate in society and live an ordinary life’. Heather also talked about the need to involve people in designing services … something we were about to attempt.

As the audience split into workshop groups, a small gathering including Cathy Gormal and some of her colleagues from Renfrewshire Libraries, found a quiet corner in which to try out some rapid co-design.

We’ve had a number of conversations over the months about services which provide advice at a particular location – the local Citizens Advice Bureau, voluntary groups, the library or perhaps the GP surgery. We wanted to explore with the group what works and what doesn’t when accessing this type of service.

We looked at the entire journey – from how we might find out about such a service to how we would get there, the problems of access, the challenge of getting the most out of a consultation and then what we’re likely to come away with.

Time was short but some useful points came up:

  • we often find out about these services by word of mouth although posters work in places like GP surgeries, supermarkets, libraries and the like.
  • access, in its widest sense, needs to be flexible. Drop-in arrangements might be more useful because getting around on public transport (particularly with mobility issues) can be unpredictable – so appointments might be missed.
  • there must be ways of taking the service to people rather than having to go to a particular place?
  • framing the question is difficult sometimes – what is it that I really want to know? there’s so much I probably need to know about, what is it that’s important right now?
  • the question isn’t always about ‘health’
  • training is important for everyone involved in the journey – for those asking and those giving information.
  • we need to come away with printed information and some kind of follow up. A phone call perhaps?

Throughout the discussions the need to have someone to call on for help was mentioned. We gradually built up a picture of an info-buddy – someone who would:

  • help us to think about what we want to find out – ahead of time. Maybe using a mind-map to show the types of information available.
  • translate our needs and concerns into useful enquiries
  • prepare us for the consultation – ensure we get out of it what we need.
  • maybe accompany us to the consultation – or bring the service to us if we can’t make it to the location.
  • ensure we come away with the information we need in a form we can use.

Useful stuff.

As I wandered back to the exhibition hall I was thinking back to the workshop we held in Paisley last year – and how the group I had been facilitating had worked up a nice idea about volunteers helping people navigate the disability benefits system. The people around the table agreed that the services we needed to put in place to make the idea work exist already – they would just need to be joined up in a useful way.

So I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised when I bumped into the people at You First – Advocacy Service. You First supports individuals living in Renfrewshire who need help engaging with advice services. They’ll come along to appointments with you, write or telephone agencies on your behalf. I also picked up information about the Renfrewshire Carers Centre and discovered that they run an Advocacy Project that can help carers to access social work, health, housing or education services.

Maybe the beginnings of an Info-Buddy service are already in place in Renfrewshire.

Events like this are incredibly valuable for making connections, starting conversations, raising awareness and to show the local support that’s available – I came away with information about Recovery Across Mental Health, the Renfrewshire Visually Impaired Forum, the West of Scotland branch of Ataxia UK and others as well as some ideas and phone numbers to follow up.

Thanks to everybody who came along and contributed to the workshop. It was fun and useful but, as I mentioned at the time, the outcomes will help us to shape an idea we’re working on. If you’d like to be involved do get in touch.

Posted in co-creation, Health Assets, reflections, workshops | 1 Comment