Award for the Best Local Social Prescribing Link Worker Team/Service - Social Prescribing Awards 2024
The Edinburgh Community Link Workers (CLWs) team has been awarded the Best Local Social Prescribing Link Worker Team 2024, to recognise their outstanding contribution to health and wellbeing in Edinburgh's most deprived areas.
The team of 24 link workers cover 45 practices, ensuring they are deeply embedded in their communities through employment by nine Third Sector Organisations (TSOs).
The link workers have strengthened ties between medical practices and local communities, securing funding for TSOs to develop patient-specific services such as anxiety management, yoga, art therapy, and wild swimming. Their collaboration with the University of Edinburgh Medical School has introduced over 800 future GPs to the benefits of social prescribing, receiving overwhelmingly positive feedback from students.
A social prescribing patient said of their link worker: "I do hope you know you are amazing at what you do and in all the years, you’re the first professional who made me feel more positive and start changing my life and it’s getting there slowly but surely.
“I’m forever thankful to you for your help at a time when everything seemed hopeless. I wouldn’t say I am a million per cent back to normal but I just feel something different now that what I never felt months ago. And I know if things ever take another bad turn, I know I have people like yourself to talk to.”
In six years, the Edinburgh Community Link Workers have:
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Received 19,220 referrals
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Conducted 44,920 engagements
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Made 29,425 links to services
Alison Leitch, Assistant Service Manager, Edinburgh CLW Network, nominated the team. She said: “The Edinburgh CLWs' relentless dedication and innovative approach make them truly deserving of this award, setting a benchmark for link working across Scotland. Their resilience in the past few years, through the pandemic, cost of living crisis and local housing emergency, has been remarkable.”
