The number of people over 65 in Scotland is projected to rise by a third by mid-2045. There is a need to improve health and social care for people living with frailty. Healthcare Improvement Scotland's new frailty programme aims to do that.

What is frailty?

Frailty can affect people as young as 50 years old and 10% of people over 65 live with it. Frailty is someone’s ability to recover from things like illness and injury. It can be related to:

• increased risk of disability
• hospital admission
• institutional care, or
• death.

The impact on a person’s quality of life is considerable. It increases use of primary care and unplanned secondary care services.

Identifying and treating symptoms early is important. Frailty can be managed or reversed, improving people’s quality of life and wellbeing. Aligning community health and social care services means successful treatment is more likely. Coordinated care and support attuned to the specific needs of the person also helps.

Join the Focus on Frailty programme

Healthcare Improvement Scotland is recruiting teams to join the Focus on Frailty programme. The programme will help teams make improvements to services accessed by people living with, or at risk of living with frailty. The programme brings together:

• NHS boards
• health and social care partnerships
• GP practices, and
• the third and independent sector.

Teams will gain access to:

• learning sessions
• quality improvement coaching, and
• data and measurement expertise.

The programme is supported by an evidence-based package of frailty support. Frailty professionals from across disciplines, sectors and regions helped co-design this package. Organisations and individuals with a focus on lived, and living, experience also contributed. It builds on Healthcare Improvement Scotland’s 90 day learning cycle on frailty.

Find out more about our work by downloading the evidence-based package of frailty support and the 90 day learning cycle on frailty. You can also join the frailty learning network MS Teams.