The Care Homes at Scale (CHAS) service has various strands and is growing and evolving as we try to find new and innovative ways to improve our services for people living in care homes.

This year (2022) has seen a continuation of an enhanced GP led multi-disciplinary approach for residents with complex needs in participating care homes which provides an enhanced service to GP practices and improved coordination of patient care across partner organisations.

CHAS has also delivered weekly GP and Advanced Nurse Practitioner (ANP) led ward rounds to three care homes where demand exceeds capacity. This service enables patients who are medically stable to leave the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital, continue their recovery and receive reablement support in a more homely care home environment.

We have also commenced a year-long pilot that has seen an ANP work with practices and care homes in the East Norwich Neighbourhood to support staff and residents with end-of-life care planning and long-term condition reviews. The ANP has also been able to attend to other urgent reviews and offer advice and guidance in other cases, which has diverted requests away from GP practices. We are already evaluating the outcomes of this pilot and exploring how this service could be expanded in the coming year.

Preparations are also underway currently to deliver Covid autumn boosters to the Learning Disability (LD) and Severe Mental Illness (SMI) care homes within CHAS by the same team who have attended previously. We hope this will go some way to providing familiarity and reassurances to staff and service users alike.