Figures reveal impact of fuel poverty project

Nearly 700 people have been put on a pathway to improve their health as part of a scheme to mitigate the impact of fuel poverty.

A further 556 have had their medicines optimised during the project to improve outcomes for people with poor respiratory health.

Health Innovation North West Coast and NHS Cheshire and Merseyside have coordinated the scheme which has focused on adults with severe COPD and children with early signs of asthma.

The project called on the Combined Intelligence for Population Health (CIPHA) data system to develop a dashboard that helped identify appropriate individuals to support.

The project team, which included partners from industry and charities, then used population health management themes to agree a variety of interventions, including the payment of fuel bills and lifestyle reviews.

The aim was to ensure individuals could adequately heat their homes and so mitigate the impact of fuel poverty on their health and ease pressures on health services.

You can read more about the award-winning COPD scheme, and the toolkit that arose from it, here. You can read more about the child-focused scheme here.

The scheme’s highlights so far include:

• 685 patients identified and put on a pathway
• £389,500 payments from local authority household support funds were facilitated
• Over 550 referrals to local authority-commissioned affordable warmth schemes
• 347 referrals to wellbeing and social prescribing teams
• 310 families added to priority services registers with energy providers

Interviews with patients suggest they are using less primary and secondary care after the interventions, while early academic findings also indicate a reduction in the number of presentations at A&E.

The project is part of NHS England’s Innovation for Healthcare Inequalities Programme.