Occupational Therapy News OTnews July 2019 | Page 22

FEATURE SOCIAL PRESCRIBING
A prescription for occupation
T
here has been a huge growth in the numbers of staff
delivering social prescribing, but how much do they
adhere to ideas around occupation?
That’s one of the questions being tackled at the
University of Salford’s social prescribing hub.
The hub was developed last
year and has two occupational
therapists in its core team –
We recognised that
Sarah Bodell and Rachel Martin
– alongside other staff with
there are lots of schemes that
backgrounds in nursing, social
use activities such as gardening,
policy and community learning.
knitting and art to enhance
Says Sarah: ‘When the
social prescribing agenda hit
wellbeing, but we also noted
the news and there was lots of
The team, including Sarah Bodell (second
that there was little discussion
from right) at Salford prescribing hub
conversation about this is what
around
person,
environment
occupational therapists have
always done, and we thought yes
The team put together a funding bid with
and occupation fit.
that’s right – but, it’s not just us who
the university to the Higher Education Innovation
do social prescribing.
Fund in 24 hours. They won funding for the hub
‘We recognised that there are lots of
to bring a solid theoretical underpinning to social
schemes that use activities such as gardening,
prescribing practice, to produce tools and resources that will
knitting and art to enhance wellbeing, but we also noted that there
be of practical use, and to share expertise in the form of training or
was little discussion around person, environment and occupation
evaluation.
fit. We wondered if this might be a reason that some of the social
The team threads occupational therapy through all the hub’s
prescribing outcomes are variable.
work, and the two occupational therapists are closely aligned with a
‘So we decided to embrace the opportunity, look at if there was
project to develop a new social prescribing assessment tool for link
a way in which we can help everyone doing social prescribing by
workers.
exposing them to the concept of occupation, health and wellbeing,
‘It’s a framework to guide the assessment of how best to
while at the same time advocating for occupational therapy.’
support someone via social prescribing,’ says Sarah. ‘There is
22 OTnews July 2019
‘‘
A team at the University of Salford is drawing on occupational
therapy skills to make sure occupation stays at the heart of the
social prescribing agenda. Sarah Bodell tells Andrew Mickel
what they are working on