‘Relationship building and being a conduit for agencies to work closely is our goal’

Sylvia Baikie (pictured) became a Public Health Practitioner (PHP) nine years ago. She is one of four Public Health Practitioners (PHPs) working within the Edinburgh Health and Social Care Partnership, and currently her work focuses on services and support in the North East of Edinburgh.

Here she shares a flavour of their work as we begin to emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Social Isolation and loneliness was a public health issue prior to COVID-19, but events over the last two years have exacerbated this.?The Edinburgh Poverty Commission published its findings towards the end of 2020, in the middle of the pandemic. Its call to action sets out clearly what needs to happen to end poverty in the city, and health and social care organisations very much have a role to play in that.

“Our team looks at the Health and Social Care Partnership work through that lens. We work with colleagues across health and social care, voluntary and third sector, the council and grassroots community groups.

“Relationship building is at the heart of what we do as we work to connect things together – engage, listen and identify common themes. In doing so, we are continuously building our understanding of where there are gaps in meeting needs – and in particular where people are being impacted by inequalities. With information, qualitative data, and insights, we can then make the case to influence policy, service solutions, or even service creation.

“We’re largely about education and prevention to support better health outcomes, and how we all play a part in looking after own health and wellbeing. But, it isn’t a level playing field out there, particularly for those who experience differences in the social determinants of health such as trauma and poverty. Making sure income maximisation advice and support is easily accessible is one example - we work with city advice agencies to embed Welfare Rights Advisers in GP practices.??We also very recently worked in partnership with Home Energy Scotland to ensure fuel poverty advice was easily accessible to people who could benefit from this. To reach them, we organised for Home Energy Scotland information and advisors to be present at some of our vaccinations clinics, over the recent winter period.

“It’s difficult to measure what you prevent. When you are trying to influence outcomes that stem from so many interlinked factors and systems, you need to think about evidence differently. Qualitative data is so important to what we do. Trends and changes in lived experience. We build case studies and look at community and social patterns such as accessing of foodbanks, uptake in vaccinations in various communities, footfall to GP practices and services there. There’s so much information and insights needed to understand what’s going on and where action can be most effective – we are fortunate to have great relationships with our colleagues across all different sectors and we work and learn together.

“It’s not always easy, particularly when trying to understand what the picture looks like where people are isolated or not engaging with services at all.         

“However, one of the most positive things that has come out of the pandemic is that we can see quite clearly more examples of communities coming together. People have been there for their friends and neighbours. In addition, the voluntary and third sector has done an extraordinary amount of work which has accelerated learning and action. So much so that legacies have been created – long-term groups and collaborations have formed, and organisations are working together to bid for funding where there are shared responsibilities and objectives.

“Partnership working is key and it is central to a lot of the work that PHPs do. There is not one service that can meet the needs of individuals and so we need to form close working relationships with other partner agencies to meet the needs of our communities. Relationship building and being a conduit for agencies to work closely to meet the complex and varied needs of individuals, families and communities is our goal.”

You can find out more around the partnerships and work of the Edinburgh Health and Social Care Partnership in terms of tackling inequalities, here.