The Well-being Star is a holistic, person-centred, outcomes focused and strengths-based tool. It encourages people with long-term health conditions to consider a range of factors that have an impact on their quality of life.
It was developed with DoH funding in collaboration with North East Essex PCT and can be used in a variety of settings from hospices to rehabilitation centres and social prescribing services. The Star supports and measures progress in eight areas identified by patients, health professionals and researchers as central to maximising well-being and independence when living with a long-term health condition (See Figure 1).
Service users may begin at the bottom of the Journey of Change (‘Not thinking about it’) and the aim is to progress to things the situation being ‘as good as it can be’.
We have recently conducted further validation work on the Well-being Star within Ways to Wellness, a social prescribing service using the Well-being Star. Ways to Wellness is an innovative service for people whose daily lives are affected by certain long-term health conditions such as diabetes, epilepsy or heart disease.
Our psychometric validation presents evidence that the eight outcome areas form a coherent measure, with no repetition and good sensitivity to detecting change. Since publishing the first version of this factsheet we have expanded the sample of link workers who have taken part in our peer-reviewed case study method for assessing how reliably workers apply the scales. The findings using the larger sample confirmed initial positive results showing good understanding of how to use the Well-being Star’s scale descriptions.
Chief Executive of Ways to Wellness, Tara Case is talking alongside our Strategic Director, Joy MacKeith, about the Well-being Star in the context of social prescribing and payment by results at the upcoming Government Outcomes Lab International Social Outcomes Conference.
Their session “Measuring what matters: an innovative outcomes tool capturing what is most important to beneficiaries” contributes towards the broader topic “Back to the Future? Learning from the UK’s experience with impact bonds: what should we take with us and what should we leave behind?” and takes place 15.30–17:00 (UK BST) on Tuesday, 1st September. Register to attend free of charge via Eventbrite.
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Triangle is the social enterprise behind the Outcomes Star. Triangle exists to help people reach their highest potential. Through the Outcomes Star, they work with services to promote and measure individual change and to enable learning at an individual, service, organisation and sector-wide levels. The Outcomes Star is an evidence-based management tool for both supporting and measuring change. For more information email info@triangleconsulting.co.uk.
Ways to Wellness is a service for people in the west of Newcastle whose daily lives are affected by certain long-term health conditions. GPs and their primary care teams use social prescribing to refer patients to the service. Ways to Wellness adds to and complements the medical support that people receive, to help them feel more confident to manage their long-term conditions and make positive lifestyle choices. For more information email info@waystowellness.org.uk.
The Well-being Star is available to all organisations with a Star licence, and full training can be given for workers and managers. For more information on the Outcomes Star, please contact us on info@triangleconsulting.co.uk or +44 (0) 207 272 8765.
