Search results

The purpose of this paper is to illustrate how local drug services use their senior staff to respond to emerging ethnic groups presenting to treatment using flexible thinking and innovative processes.

The methodology was a case study design that used a semi-structured questionnaire that looked at two drug services and their staff’s influence on service delivery in different boroughs of east London.

The research found very innovative findings from the two boroughs. The boroughs had different racial mixes and therefore differing populations presenting to their local drug services. However, they used flexible approaches to structure their services to engage with emerging ethnic minority populations in drug treatment. From the findings, these different approaches and structures of providing drug treatment were very important. Approaches, for example, of clinical staff offering a “rapid assessment” are particularly important in engaging and retaining ethnic minority populations. Also, using flexible thinking within the staff team enables drug services to adapt treatments to be flexible in responding to emerging ethnic populations.

This paper shows that thinking in designing approaches to drug treatment shows that ethnic minority populations can be successfully engaged in drug treatment. This has implications for drug treatment nationally and across Europe where there are “emerging” ethnic populations presenting for drug treatment.

This paper shows that drug services can adapt and change to their different ethnic minority populations if they can able to be flexible in their clinical approach to service provision.

Islington adopted the Public Libraries Acts in 1904, and in December of that year James Duff Brown, Librarian of the adjoining borough of Finsbury, was appointed first Chief Librarian (at a salary of £300 per annum) and a programme for the erection of library buildings was planned. Following an architectural competition, Islington Central Library opened its doors in October 1907.

This paper looks at ISIS, the primary care service that was set up in the London borough of Islington to improve throughput into GP prescribing services from the drug‐using population. ISIS is a service developed from a statutory and voluntary sector initiative that was developed with a GP shared‐care model in its design. It is led by a GP and two non‐medical prescribing nurses to service a population that would not stay with the service but would be managed through the project to GP prescribing services.Over the course of the first year, however, while throughput to GP services improved, the numbers were still too low for the model to work effectively. Just under half of GPs were not offering services to this population, and there were a number of more complex patients who needed to be referred to a specialist drug agency.Results from the annual audit showed that there was a population of clients who were responding well to treatment but did not have a prescribing GP to be referred on to. This paper highlights these stable patients and argues that this population can be managed in a GP‐led service such as ISIS. Revisions to service design and commissioning objectives may be required, but should be easy to implement.

In 1983 Islington Library Service published a report as part of the London Borough of Islington/Inner London Education Authority Learners Advisory Service research project. Based on sympathetic interviews from which extensive quotations have been drawn, the report explores the learning needs of adults in Islington. The setting up of the Islington project was timely and the outcome of developments in the two related fields of continuing education and librarianship.

This paper examines a common presentation to primary care and specialist drug services. Often patients who are experiencing opioid dependencies when stabilising on methadone often increase their consumption of alcohol. Also, increasingly so, polydrug use is a growing presentation with heroin, crack and alcohol use used in dependent patterns when presenting for treatment.There is often a lack of alcohol detoxification treatment packages given to those who are on methadone, and often some prescribers in the area of substance use regard an alcohol detoxification programme when prescribing methadone as too risky. This has led to a reluctance in general to prescribe an alcohol detoxification programme for many patients who request it. This is the case in Islington, London.This paper looks at a new service set up in Islington, London and looks at the way it has treated the cohort of patients who have presented with polydrug use, including alcohol. It has seen that patients who were more stable on their methadone and had longer histories in treatment were more likely to complete an alcohol detoxification programme with some ‘dry’ time off alcohol. It proposes that while there is a risk of prescribing alcohol detoxification regimes with methadone, there is a cohort of patients were this can be prescribed with a favourable outcome.

Work underway in the London borough of Islington aims to lessen the risk of fire in the homes of vulnerable people such as those with mental health issues, learning disabilities or problems with drugs or alcohol. A partnership approach helps ensure that a range of community agencies engage with key fire safety messages for the benefit of their clients.

This report is the result of a five‐month survey of information provision in the London Borough of Islington. It looks at information on learning opportunities for adults and complements Brenda Neale's survey of adult learner needs which identified a lack of accessible information as a major barrier for adults in the Borough wishing to return to learning.

Morgan Grenfell & Co Ltd (Morgan Grenfell) entered into a ten‐year interest rate swap contract with Welwyn Hatfield District Council (Welwyn) on the basis that Morgan Grenfell would be the fixed rate payer and Welwyn, the floating rate payer.

This study aims to present a case study about the Team Around Me (TAM) model of case coordination which was developed by Fulfilling Lives Islington and Camden (FLIC) as an action experiment. The model is a standardised tool for running case conferences for clients experiencing multiple disadvantage (MD).

Deploying a case study approach, this study explores why a TAM-coordinated approach is beneficial for people experiencing MD.

The authors explore why the need for effective case coordination is integral for clients experiencing MD, and how current structures fail to facilitate effective case management. The authors put forward an argument for the four core principles underpinning the TAM model: strengths-based, action-focussed, systems thinking and client involvement. The barriers to embedding and upscaling this approach are discussed, alongside the obstacles presented by the wider system that prevent wider implementation.

The TAM model is a new approach to case conferences, designed and upscaled by FLIC, and has since been adopted across two London boroughs, and training has reached services across the UK. This paper highlights the need for innovative approaches to case coordination that centre client involvement, promote a strengths-based approach and recognise system blockages as a key barrier to client progress.