My first EASYCareHealth blog

I am excited and a bit overwhelmed about what to put in my first EASYCareHealth blog. The challenge is to summarise a life’s work, and plans for local and global development in a few sentences.

You might have noticed the change in name from EASYCare to EASYCareHealth. This is to distinguish our work from others using the Easycare brand, which include a car wash and a sheep shearing company. Our mission remains the same: to improve the lives of older people throughout the world by identifying threats to health, independence and well-being and mobilise a response based on the priorities of the older person and their families, using EASYCareHealth methods, including standardised assessment instruments, training and information management. We have set up a new Social Enterprise, EASYCareHealth (see attached brochure), to take our work forward at scale and pace.

Locally, we will be testing the approach as part of developing a Community Well-being Service in Solihull, and a Primary Care Well-being Service in South Birmingham. Both Projects have national support for developing health and care systems which have the potential to be replicated elsewhere in England.

Following our successful 2015 EASYCare International Conference (report attached), we have ambitious plans for implementing our approach in China, India, South East Asia, East Africa, the Middle East, Europe and Central America. UK Trade and Industry are helping us develop plans for these regions and build contacts with organisations and individuals who can help with the work. Next week, I will be in Chaing Mai, Thailand, at the International Association of Geriatrics and Gerontology Asia Conference on Ageing , leading a seminar with colleagues from the EASYCareHealth Asia network, on the experience of using the EASYCareHealth approach in five Asian Countries. I look forward to reporting the outcomes in my next blog!

A fantastic Seattle-based clinical information systems development company, Caradigm, will be working with us on our Solihull demonstration Project and perhaps also with our international work. I am looking forward to future meetings in Seattle!

I hope this blog whets your appetite. Please add comments about your experience and ambitions for our work together.

Prof. Ian