Marked improvement in wellbeing of those helped by £1.5m fund

MORE THAN 550 people in North Yorkshire have been helped by a £1.5m fund to help groups that enable people to become less reliant on statutory health and social care support.

North Yorkshire County Council’s Innovation Fund has invested in dozens of projects since it was set up in 2011. Knaresboroughbased Your Consortium, which manages the fund, has published a new report on the impact of projects supported in 2015 and 2016 and found that people who took part demonstrated “clear overall improvement” in how they felt about their wellbeing.

The report also said: “There were measurable improvements in mental health, perception of personal value and improvements in social connections.”

North Yorkshire’s executive member for adult services and health integration Coun Michael Harrison, said: “This investment supports the County Council’s priority of helping people to maintain their independence and to encourage local communities to care for their residents.

“The Innovation Fund supports the transformation and sustainability of adult health and social care in North Yorkshire by helping voluntary and community organisations to devise innovative approaches to early intervention and prevention.

The success of these recent projects builds on earlier work supported by the fund.”

The current round of funding will be the last in its current form. In future, innovation funding will be incorporated into the County Council’s Stronger Communities programme, which supports development of community-run services that improve the health and wellbeing of older people, vulnerable adults and carers.