Citizen Advisors - Turning Point

Turning Point Connected Care Report 40
design, and efforts need to be made to inform all agencies of the service so as
to avoid this.
7.2 Future work
The recommendations above set out a vision for community-led Citizen Advisor
services and they capture a new approach to service delivery that is not ‘service’
focused but ‘people’ focused. The recommendations propose that Citizen
Advisors are recruited from and based in the heart of their local communities.
They should operate at the interface between primary care and the community,
with a remit to provide a joined up approach to multiple challenges and remove
layers of bureaucracy, not add to it.
Whilst there are a number of examples across the UK of initiatives that have
included some form of Citizen Advisor, the evidence base to support their
effectiveness and their future implementation needs to be strengthened. Few of
the examples discussed in this review have been fully evaluated, and of those
that have, several adopted a qualitative methodology which suggests the main
benefits include; improved quality of life, the provision of practical support
leading to greater independence, a sense of empowerment and the
development of trusting relationships with the workers themselves. However, as
Hudson (2010) comments in his review of Local Area Coordination, “the
evaluators were unable to be sure that these positive changes had come about
because of LAC per se, as opposed to the commitment and support of the
dedicated workers.”
There is therefore a clear need to develop a robust evaluation tool in order to
assess and appraise the process and outcomes of delivering service navigation.
Outcomes need to be agreed, understood and supported at every level and
evaluation should be put in place at the start so that learning can be shared. In
turn, this will help contribute to the development of an evidence base
surrounding the benefits of the Citizen Advisor model.