Merlin Housing Society launches new sheltered service on National Older People’s Day
01 Oct 2008
Older people in South Gloucestershire are to benefit from Merlin Housing Society’s new sheltered housing service which is being launched today on National Older People’s Day.
Sheltered housing residents will receive support tailored to their individual needs under the new service, which has been launched after a year-long review into the way Merlin supports the 1,300 residents at its 51 sheltered schemes. From today teams of support advisors will be based at eight regional hubs, from where they will travel out to the sheltered schemes in their area to deliver bespoke support to individuals.
Support advisors will spend most of their time at the sheltered schemes providing support to residents. And at many schemes the support advisor will be the same person who previously looked after residents.
Head of supported housing Caroline McClean said: “This is an exciting time for staff and residents as we are finally launching the much anticipated new service. Staff have been working hard to support the changes and ensure minimum disruption to residents. The improved staff structure of eight hub teams will continue to deliver the support service but will also offer greater flexibility to meet the changing needs of residents.
“It is really appropriate that we are launching this new service on National Older Peoples Day as we believe that the change we have made will be beneficial to residents. We will now be able to tailor our support to residents’ individual needs and to provide better standards of care to residents, especially those who have high support needs.
“Ultimately our goal is to provide a support service not just to residents of our sheltered schemes, but also to other tenants and the wider community as well.”
Merlin’s sheltered service is already playing a greater role in the communities as four of its schemes are venues for the Golden-Oldies signing sessions which launched in South Gloucestershire last month.