Making Shared Practice a Success – Roy Castle FagEnds Stop Smoking Services in Liverpool Children’s Centres
| Author(s)
Amanda Riley
| | Presenter(s) |
Amanda Riley Sure Start Stop Smoking Co-ordinator, Roy Castle Lung Cancer Foundation, Liverpool | Abstract In 2009, FagEnds began to co-ordinate a service level agreement for Liverpool’s 26 Children’s Centres in providing specialist stop smoking support for their service users.
The Children’s Centres are a government programme whose aims are to deliver the best start in life for every child by bringing together early education, childcare, health and family support. Thus, helping parents to stop smoking and reducing children’s exposure to second hand smoke is high on their agenda and is deeply implemented in their infant mortality strategy.
The Children’s Centres are located in the most deprived areas. From a stop smoking service perspective, this is an excellent opportunity to access hard to reach and vulnerable group’s.
Each week, FagEnds provide groups or 1-1’s in each Children’s Centre. As a result of this, familiarity and being seen on a regular basis allows the users to build a good rapport with their Stop Smoking Advisor, which in turn makes the clients feel relaxed as they know they can quit and get the support as and when is ready for them.
Children’s Centres are based within areas that are identified as hard to reach, similarly stop smoking services are positioned likewise. Working collaboratively has proven to be beneficial in meeting the needs of service users. Roy Castle FagEnds would like to share their experiences and encourage others working within this field to take on board this ethos and recognise that joint working within this target audience can be successful.
| Source of funding: Liverpool City Council
| Declaration of interest: None
| | |
|
