During our first five years, Lofty Heights witnessed many hospital discharges ‘fail on the doorstep’ due to unhygienic, cold, cluttered, or hoarded homes not being identified until the day of discharge, which in turn resulted in re-admission.
In 2018 Lofty Heights launched its Homeward Bound Service, a dedicated hospital discharge service with the aim of facilitating earlier, safer hospital discharges, reducing the number of delayed discharges and re-admissions.
The Homeward Bound service offers up to four hours practical assistance, decluttering rooms or areas of the home to enable essential work to be carried out, such as level access showers or central heating repairs, moving furniture to make way for hospital beds or assistive technology to be installed, removing slip, trip and fall hazards, clearing gardens/overgrown pathways that block access to front and back doors, impeding access for the patient, family carers, paramedics, visiting healthcare professional and agency carers.
Whilst in the property the team will check smoke alarms, ensure gas/electricity and heating supplies are working, and that any food waste or out of date items are removed, whilst soiled or damaged furniture is removed and replaced.
We have continued to grow and develop the service since its inception, and it has been very well received by patients and referrers alike.
“The CCGs (Clinical Commissioning Group) are extremely pleased with the quality of their work, I am very happy to recommend Lofty Heights CIC, and trust that your experience with them will be as positive as mine”
Fiona Sutton, NHS Contract Manager, Ipswich and East Suffolk, Clinical Commissioning Group.
When Lofty Heights launched the Homeward Bound service, we originally planned to carry out up 16 short jobs per month. Over the most recent quarter we received 76 referrals in total, that is more than 25 referrals per month.
