Have your say on the health-related behaviour change service

Closed 10 Mar 2023

Opened 9 Jan 2023

Contact

Nicola Blake

(Health Improvement Principal (Health Behaviours and Health Checks))

07824 085 355

public.health@eastsussex.gov.uk

Feedback updated 5 Jul 2023

We asked

One You East Sussex helps residents to eat well, manage their weight, move more, quit smoking and drink less. The contract for the service ends in March 2024. We asked what you thought about our plans to change the service model in future. 

You said

The majority who took part agreed with the proposed change. You said that targeting those most in need is sensible and that the proposed approach is cost effective.

For the third of people who disagreed there were some clear themes when it came to your concerns, some of which were also shared by those who agreed or were neutral. The main feedback was:

  • It is vital to have a range of contact methods.  
  • Retain some flexibility around the type of support offered irrespective of whether an individual is in the target groups for the service.
  • Those who cannot access online will be excluded.
  • The approach should be led by individual need.

You also provided feedback on how we spend any budget saved from the changes and which programmes you think are most important. Your top choice for any money freed up by making the change was for it to be reinvested in providing mental health support that aids health-related behaviour change, while being more physically active and mental health to aid behaviour change were the programmes that were most important to you.

We did

The proposed change to the service has been approved and will apply from 1 April 2024 when the new contract starts. All your comments and feedback have been reviewed and we have identified a number of requirements we can add to the new contract to address your main concerns and feedback.

It was always our plan that the provider would be able to be flexible in how they worked with people. In response to your feedback, we will make this clearer in the service model by making personalised care to meet an individual’s identified need one of the key principles of the service. The provider would also be expected to review decisions made about people’s support needs in the early stages to ensure they were correct. This would allow the provider to be flexible around contact methods, how support is offered and meeting people’s individual needs. It’s important to note though that people’s needs might be different to their preferences.

We will include a requirement for the new provider to help tackle digital inclusion, both through the work they do directly with people and through putting people in touch with other providers. This might include offering skills training, helping people to access technology and tackling barriers to digital inclusion such as motivation, trust and useability. 

The new service will include a focus on helping people to make behaviour changes by offering mental wellbeing support to those experiencing low to moderate anxiety, stress and depression. When it comes to physical activity, we will expect the service to develop a good knowledge of local health and wellbeing opportunities. This will mean that its staff can tell people about local opportunities that will help them to make and sustain changes to their behaviour.

Results updated 5 Jul 2023

Thank you to everyone who took the time to share your views in this consultation. A decision to go ahead with the proposed change to the service was made on 12 June by the Lead Cabinet Member for Adult Social Care & Health. The new service will launch on 1 April 2024, with procurement beginning over the summer of 2023. You can view the papers and the minutes from the meeting on our website.

120 people took part in the public survey, while 49 people were at the meetings we visited to talk about our proposal. The majority supported the proposed change, while just under a third disagreed. All your comments and feedback have been reviewed and we have identified a number of requirements we can add to the new contract to address your main concerns. These focused on contact methods, flexibility, and digital exclusion.

You can find a summary of the results below, and the ‘you said, we did’ section above explains what has changed as a result of your feedback.

Summary of the consultation results

Who took part?

Nearly half of the respondents to the survey took part as East Sussex residents, while a quarter were either present or past users of the current service. Most of the other respondents were working in health and wellbeing roles.

We had responses from across the county, although we had more from some areas than others. For example, nearly a third live in the Rother district, compared to 6% for the Lewes district.

We had responses from all age groups apart from those who are 24 and under. Men were also underrepresented in the responses. In contrast, we had a reasonable number of responses from people who have a physical or mental health condition, and from those with caring responsibilities.

What did we learn?

Views on the proposal: 58% agree with our proposal, but 29% do not. The rest chose ‘neither agree nor disagree’.

Comment themes on people’s views: There are some clear and consistent themes from the comments. Some cover people’s reasons for agreeing with the proposal, while others focus on their concerns. The top themes are: 

  • It’s vital to have a range of contact methods (19 people - of whom 14 disagreed with the proposal and 5 agreed)
  • Retain some flexibility around the type of support offered irrespective of whether an individual is in the target groups (17 people - of whom 10 agreed with the proposal, 2 were neutral and 5 disagreed)
  • Targeting those most in need is sensible (16 people - of whom 15 agreed with the proposal and 1 was neutral)
  • The proposed approach is cost-effective (9 people – all of whom agreed with the proposal)
  • Those who cannot access online will be excluded (8 people – of whom 6 disagreed with the proposal and 2 were neutral)
  • The approach must be led by individual need (8 people - of whom 4 disagreed with the proposal, 3 agreed and 1 was neutral)

How people would be affected: Many of the comments were about how residents generally would be affected by the change. People’s main concerns were about digital exclusion (9 people) and whether service decisions would be led by individual need (9). A similar number of people were concerned about being personally excluded from using the service (8).

Choices for spending the budget: There were some clear preferences for how people would like us to spend any money freed up by making changes to the service model. Of the 114 people who answered, the top choices were:

  1. Providing mental health support that aids health-related behaviour change. This was a first choice for 30% of respondents and a first or second choice for 48%.
  2. Meeting an increase in residents eligible for support.  This was a first choice for 25% of respondents and a first or second choice for 41%.
  3. Allowing for flexibility in the frequency and length of programmes. This was a first choice for 19% of respondents and a first or second choice for 39%.

Behaviour change programmes: There are some clear winners when it comes to which programmes are most important to respondents. Interestingly, people’s priorities for themselves are a little different to their community priorities. 119 people answered this question.

The following programmes were most important to individuals:

  1. Being more physically active. This was a first choice for 33% of respondents and a first or second choice for 55%.
  2. Mental health to aid behaviour change. This was a first choice for 25% of respondents and a first or second choice for 44%.
  3. Weight management. This was a first choice for 22% of respondents and a first or second choice for 39%.

The following programmes were most important to people’s communities: 

  1. Mental health to aid behaviour change. This was a first choice for 30% of respondents and a first or second choice for 51%.
  2. Being more physically active. This was a first choice for 27% of respondents and a first or second choice for 46%.
  3. NHS Health Checks in the community. This was a first choice for 19% of respondents and a first or second choice for 33%.

Physical activity (12 comments) and eating well (9 comments) were the topics with the most comments. The most frequent themes across all the topics were the linked health benefits of the programme in question (18) and the benefits to the community (11). A popular general suggestion was to provide more opportunities for promotion of the activities and resources that these programmes offer (8).

Other comments and suggestions: As might be expected, the comment themes were more varied for this question. There were two that were covered by more than a couple of people: ensure better cooperation with other services (7 people) and creating better awareness of the multiple ways to refer into the service (4).

Engagement meetings

The engagement meetings we attended raised some of the same concerns as the survey responses, particularly in relation to digital exclusion (4 comments) and who will be eligible for the targeted support (4). New themes raised through the discussions were around access to physical service locations and transport (5) and how the service best supports those with mental health needs (4).

Overview

One You East Sussex helps residents to eat well, manage their weight, move more, quit smoking and drink less. The contract for the service ends in March 2024. We are thinking about changing the future service model. This consultation explains our thinking and what the changes would mean for residents and professionals who refer people to the service. 

The service would continue to offer a holistic health assessment to all eligible residents, and everyone would have access to online support programmes to help them make changes to their health-related behaviours. More intensive forms of support would only be routinely offered to those with the highest needs who could gain the greatest health benefits. Intensive forms of support might include face-to-face support from a health coach, or a weight management group delivered online or in person.

This would help us tackle health inequalities by offering greater levels of support to those who need it the most; for example, those living in areas where deprivation levels are high and life expectancy is lower than average, or people living with a disability or mental health issue. Any savings from these changes would be used by the service to help it achieve the best possible health outcomes for residents and communities. 

What you tell us will be summarised in a consultation report and will inform the Equality Impact Assessment. A final decision on the proposed change to the service model will be made by the Lead Member for Adult Social Care & Health in June 2023.

You can fill in the survey online or on paper, but you can also send us a letter or email – whatever works for you.

The consultation closes on 10 March 2023.

  • Complete the online survey by clicking the link below. 
  • Email us your survey or feedback: public.health@eastsussex.gov.uk 
  • Get in touch to request a paper survey that you can post back to us. Email is the best way of contacting us, but you can call if needed.

An easy read version of the survey can be downloaded here and sent to FREEPOST ESCC PUBLIC HEALTH, County Hall, St Anne’s Crescent, Lewes, BN7 1UE. If you need this information in any other format or language,
or if you need help to take part, please contact us.

Privacy: We don't ask you to provide any personal information in the questionnaire, although there is an optional ‘about you’ section at the end. Please ensure that any comments don't include names or personal details of you or anyone else. You can find our privacy notice about how the data will be stored on our website.

Areas

  • All Areas

Audiences

  • Voluntary groups or organisations
  • Public sector groups or organisations
  • User groups or forums
  • Staff
  • Providers of services
  • Residents of East Sussex

Interests

  • Health and wellbeing