Menter 'Twilight Service' working well
Menter Cwm Gwendraeth’s Twilight Service to help patients leave hospital and return to the community has been going from strength to strength.
The service operates from 2pm-10pm Thursday to Monday, offering free car transport home from accident and emergency departments at Prince Philip and Glangwili hospitals to vulnerable patients.
Twilight Service manager Janet Hague said: “In recent months we have been breaking records in terms of the number of people able to return home.
“We helped 70 people return home in November, and 60 in December despite the weather being so bad.
“We do assessments in people’s homes. Our role is to help people to stay at home where they want to be, and avoid having to go back into hospital, by providing suitable services at home.”
She said that the Twilight Service continued to co-operate with other agencies to make it possible for people to leave hospital and move back home. It was also focusing on safety in the home including whether fire alarms or new locks need to be fitted.
A team of Bangor University researchers recently hailed the hospital transport service as a beacon of good practice.
The service operates from 2pm-10pm Thursday to Monday, offering free car transport home from accident and emergency departments at Prince Philip and Glangwili hospitals to vulnerable patients.
Researchers have estimated that the service saves a minimum of 20 bed days per month at a saving of £363 per day.
The service helps to avoid unnecessary hospital admissions by providing social care support to help people settle back at home – patients that would otherwise be admitted on to a ward without any real medical need.
As well as seeing people safely home from hospital, Twilight Service volunteers also help people settle by turning on lights and heating, making them refreshments, getting in food supplies and carrying out basic home safety checks.
They also refer and signpost to other social care services, and offer a befriending role within the hospital setting.
Although led by Menter Cwm Gwendraeth, the scheme has always been a partnership arrangement, the idea for the scheme being born in the Carmarthenshire Health, Social Care and Wellbeing Partnership, which brings together health and social care and third sector organisations.
The service operates from 2pm-10pm Thursday to Monday, offering free car transport home from accident and emergency departments at Prince Philip and Glangwili hospitals to vulnerable patients.
Twilight Service manager Janet Hague said: “In recent months we have been breaking records in terms of the number of people able to return home.
“We helped 70 people return home in November, and 60 in December despite the weather being so bad.
“We do assessments in people’s homes. Our role is to help people to stay at home where they want to be, and avoid having to go back into hospital, by providing suitable services at home.”
She said that the Twilight Service continued to co-operate with other agencies to make it possible for people to leave hospital and move back home. It was also focusing on safety in the home including whether fire alarms or new locks need to be fitted.
A team of Bangor University researchers recently hailed the hospital transport service as a beacon of good practice.
The service operates from 2pm-10pm Thursday to Monday, offering free car transport home from accident and emergency departments at Prince Philip and Glangwili hospitals to vulnerable patients.
Researchers have estimated that the service saves a minimum of 20 bed days per month at a saving of £363 per day.
The service helps to avoid unnecessary hospital admissions by providing social care support to help people settle back at home – patients that would otherwise be admitted on to a ward without any real medical need.
As well as seeing people safely home from hospital, Twilight Service volunteers also help people settle by turning on lights and heating, making them refreshments, getting in food supplies and carrying out basic home safety checks.
They also refer and signpost to other social care services, and offer a befriending role within the hospital setting.
Although led by Menter Cwm Gwendraeth, the scheme has always been a partnership arrangement, the idea for the scheme being born in the Carmarthenshire Health, Social Care and Wellbeing Partnership, which brings together health and social care and third sector organisations.
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