
Katharine Orellana
Katharine Orellana, Research Fellow at the Health and Social Care Workforce Research Unit at King’s, introduces a new article she co-authored with Kritika Samsi, Senior Research Fellow at the Unit: Older people’s day centres’ preventive work: views of day centre providers and their stakeholders. (576 words)
We asked older people’s day centre stakeholders and others working in health and social care about their views on day centres’ preventive function. Our findings, published in the International Journal of Qualitative Studies on Health and Wellbeing, highlight how work undertaken in day centres falls under the radar as a systemic contribution to the prevention agenda within health and social care.
Despite repeated government focus on growing community health and care services and current preventive efforts aiming to reduce pressure on the NHS and to move more care into the community, there has been a failure to invest in day centres.
Our research aimed to further understandings of how day centres can contribute to health and social care’s preventive agenda. We identified perceived strengths and opportunities at all three levels of prevention: primary (prevent), secondary (reduce) and tertiary (maintain). There were also systemic opportunities, such as day centres being in a position to capture and use evidence, and more joined-up working. Continue reading