2017 was a fantastic year for IFIC Scotland. First we found a new home in the International Centre for Integrated Care (IC4IC), hosted by the University of the West of Scotland, with IFIC and the Health and Social Care ALLIANCE Scotland as our founding partners, and supported by an enthusiastic cross sector Advisory Board. More stories and pictures of 2017 will be shared in our January newsletter.
We are slowly building our IFIC Scotland team as our work programme grows. I chair the Advisory Board as IFICs Senior Associate in Scotland and am ably supported by Marie Curran as IFIC Scotland coordinator. Marie facilitates IFICs Special Interest Groups on Intermediate Care, Polypharmacy and our new SIG on Palliative and End of Life Care, linking with topic specialists from across the world. You can join any / all of these SIGs by clicking here. Marie also runs our Integrated Care Matters webinar series alongside Mandy Andrew, Senior Programme manager and engagement lead for the ADVANTAGE Joint Action on Frailty. You can find out more about this collaboration in by signing up for the ADVANTAGE Newsletter or by watching the webinars. All the past webinars are available to download at integratedcarefoundation.org/scotland
Dr Karen Barrie adds a research and personal outcomes lens to our team as she supports our new evaluation projects with Hanover Scotland and NHS Ayrshire and Arran. Karen and I recently led a joint workshop on personal outcomes at APC1 in Brisbane along with colleagues from New South Wales Agency for Clinical Innovation. You can watch the presentation from the workshop here.
The University of the West of Scotland is expanding our horizons further with a new on-line Masters on Leading People-Centred Integrated Care. If you are in a health or social care policy, professional or management role in the public, voluntary or independent sectors and want more information on the Masters please contact Helen Rainey
Thanks to all who helped us host the many enjoyable study visits to Scotland by friends old and new from Spain, Singapore, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Germany, Switzerland, Ireland, Italy, Thailand, Seychelles, Brazil, Greece and Poland. We always learn and share so much through these visits.
We have greatly appreciated our collaboration with IFIC Australia, principally with our friends from Central Coast, North Coast and the University of Newcastle’s Centre for Rural and Remote Mental Health. We are also privileged to have supported WHO in work on continuity and care coordination, system transformation in South Eastern Europe, and people centred care in the Seychelles.
Now team Scotland look forward to meeting many of you and continuing to expand our knowledge networks and collaborations at ICIC18 in Utrecht.
So much to talk about and so much to learn as none of us are as smart as all of us!