Independent Lives is proud to have been nationally and locally recognised for our work in health and social care. Here are some of the awards and nominations we have received.

Guardian Public Service Award finalist 2017

The project recognised by the Guardian Public Service Award was a partnership formed between two NHS CCGs, Horsham and Mid Sussex and Crawley CCGs, and third sector organisations Independent Lives, Living Well Dying Well, and Helen Sanderson Associates.

The aim of the project was to explore how Personal Health Budgets could be used to support people at the end of life to have a ‘good death’ without adding extra financial pressures on the NHS.

By good death we mean one that puts the person reaching end of life at the centre of everything by promoting conversations, building a strong support plan that reflect the individuals personal choices and ensuring care workers, families and those close to the individual are working collaboratively and supporting each other through what is a little spoken about, difficult time.

By providing a Personal Health Budget (PHB) to individuals and a supportive framework to help them spend it on the services they wanted we were able to demonstrate a person-centred end of life care pathway that could save money.

The project was also recognised by the Third Sector Awards finalist 2017 where our Director of Services Katherine Wynne had the honour of meeting Bear Grylls!

West Sussex Partnerships in Care Accolades Unsung Hero runner up 2017

The West Sussex Care Accolades are an annual celebration of all that’s good about care provision in the county.

Luke Dummer, administration assistant for our care service, was shortlisted as an Unsung Hero because of his dedication to his work and consistently going above and beyond in his role.

Sam, Luke's line manager described his approach and attitude;

When Luke returns from holiday we always breathe a sigh of relief! He is reliable, willing and most importantly keeps us all smiling. He picks up ‘can you just do tasks’ without even questioning why.  He just cracks on with the task in hand - his commitment is outstanding.

Guardian Public Service Award winner 2016

The Clinical Training Service has been nationally recognised by the Guardian Public Service Awards. Winning the category of Learning and Development, David Brindle, The Guardian, commented;

The winners of the Guardian Public Service Awards 2016 have all challenged the way things are done. They have effected change to make services better for the people using them, better at reaching others who should use them and – an inescapable requirement in this long and bleak fiscal winter – better value for the taxpayer.

The Guardian has described the service:

West Sussex-based charity Independent Lives provides support services to people with disabilities living at home. Most are in receipt of a direct payment from the local authority or a personal health budget from the NHS.

Many of its clients employ a PA to support them in their daily lives. Despite the fact that many of these clients have complex health requirements, PAs generally have very little clinical training. And as clinical commissioning groups extend the use of personal health budgets, the need for trained PAs is increasing.

The charity has responded by developing its own training programme in conjunction with NHS England, the local continuing healthcare team and five local individuals and families who employ PAs. “We listened to them and what their needs were, so we ended up with a really good person-centred service,” says Katherine Beard, its integrated services manager.

Read The Guardian article.

Skills for Care Accolades Employer of the Year finalist 2016

Skills for Care recognised Independent Lives as one of the best employers in the country, under the employer of 5-249 people. 

As a Mindful Employer and a Disability Confident employer we positive recruit and support people with impairments into the workplace.

We are a flexible organisation with a very high rate of staff retention, and consistently score highly as an employer in our anonymous annual staff surveys.