Piloting physical activity ‘advice’ at scale
A pilot was established to develop and test a paper-based physical activity clinical advice pad (PACAP), that could be used as an aide by primary care HCPs when prescribing the amount and type of physical activity required for a patient to improve their health.
The PACAP was tested across nine local authorities, in approximately 76 healthcare settings with 446 healthcare professionals trained to use the tools including doctors, nurses, physiotherapists, health care assistants, pharmacists and health champions.
An independent evaluation by the National Centre for Sport and Exercise Medicine aimed to:
- understand which components of a physical activity prescription work and don’t work
- provide insight and evidence of the impact on patient behaviour and the potential mechanism or toolkit for scaling up this project.
During the pilot, 446 health care professionals including doctors, nurses, physiotherapists, health care assistants, pharmacists and health champions, across nine diverse geographical locations were trained, in approximately 76 health care settings.
The evaluation recommended that embedding an advice resource into electronic system, used by HCPs during primary care consultations, should be explored.
Piloting sports and exercise medicine integration in secondary care: Active Hospitals
Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust also developed an Active Hospital Toolkit to ensure ideas and resources generated in this project would be available for other hospitals and trusts across England to access and encourage patients to move more.
The interactive toolkit, currently hosted on the Moving Medicine website, includes several templates, resources, documents, case studies and process support to implement an Active Hospital approach.
More information about the Active Hospitals pilot is available on the government's website.