ICS Engagement with the Adult Social Care Sector in Decision Making: a report by GGI, Care England and the Homecare Association

The purpose of an ICS is to deliver properly joined up care, so that people accessing health and care services experience them as seamlessly as possible. It is a partnership between organisations to better meet health and care needs across an area. Despite this, it seems that effective engagement among ICSs with the ASC sector has not been consistent. Recently, much of the focus in healthcare has been more on post-pandemic restoration and recovery, although even that situation still seems to be changing rapidly.

GGI and Care England published the paper, The relationship between the adult social care sector and ICSs: time for action? in May 2021. This report explored the extent to which the ASC sector was being appropriately engaged in the ongoing development of ICSs, and updated our previous joint report,System transformation and care homes, published in 2017.

This report builds upon that work and focus more on how engagement between ICSs and theASC sector can be improved. We begin by setting out the context of the issue before presenting the findings of our qualitative research, then delving into more sector-wide issues, namely, the statistics, the future and the role ICSs have to play, as well as the ramifications of the government’s October WhitePaper and how the CQC fit in to this new system. The main body of the report ends with a reference guide for providers that lists all the ICSs by region and the local authorities within them. Followed by our conclusion and recommendations.

To inform this report, GGI held a series of interviews throughout August with ICS leaders and representatives from ASC providers across the country, as well as jointly hosting a virtual roundtable event with Care England and the Homecare Association.