Co-production in adult social care: Evaluation report

The Social Care Institute for Excellence (SCIE) has supported and evaluated Oxfordshire County Council’s programme to embed co-production into adult social care in Oxfordshire. SCIE supported the design and delivery of the programme, providing advice, support, and guidance, co-designing and delivering training, and leading the evaluation.

This evaluation covers the first two-years of the programme. It took a co-production approach; two peer researchers undertook the bulk of the fieldwork and added their insights as experienced co-production experts. SCIE co-ordinated the evaluation, working closely with the peer researchers, Oxfordshire staff and board members.

SCIE worked with the co-production board, team and senior leaders to identify and agree a set of aims and outcomes against which progress was evaluated. The evaluation found that good progress had been made against all four aims:

• Significant progress has been made embedding co-production as a way of working in Adult Social Care in Oxfordshire.
• The programme has had a positive impact on relationships between Oxfordshire County Council and people who use services, their families, carers and the voluntary sector, and led to greater shared understanding.
• There have been over 20 co-produced projects and initiatives under the programme. Interviewees were confident that the programme was positively impacting on services in Oxfordshire, and would continue to do so.
• As well as Adult Social Care, the programme has influenced work in other parts of the council such as community transport and children’s services. There is strong and growing collaboration on health with the Oxfordshire Clinical Commissioning Group. Staff from Essex, Kirklees and Slough councils have all visited Oxfordshire to learn from Oxfordshire’s experience.