The MAX project team really do value the views of the people who use our toolkit and we frequently use the feedback we receive from them to guide our ongoing revisions and promotion of the MAX toolkit. So, when a local authority (LA) analyst attending one of our information sharing events suggested that we summarise […]

Many of you working in local authority (LA) adult social care roles may have heard of the MAX toolkit but remain unsure of what it is and whether it could be useful to you (our previous blog summarises the potential benefits). Some of you may have even registered to access the toolkit but now, in […]

Local authority (LA) staff involved in our earlier research and consultations frequently reported that they – or, more commonly, the decision-makers within their organisation (e.g. managers, commissioners) – viewed with the Adult Social Care Survey (ASCS) and Carers Survey (PSS SACE) with caution and felt that the survey data had limited value for the design […]

Extensive guidance on conducting the adult social care survey (ASCS) and carers survey (PSS SACE) is provided by NHS Digital, so you may be wondering why we have included a planning guide in the MAX toolkit. And this would be a good question as, after all, what more can our planning guide possibly add? Well, […]

NHS Digital describe user-experience surveys, such as the ASCS and PSS SACE, as “the most significant pool of personal outcome information for people receiving adult social care”[i] and encourage local authorities (LAs) to use the data collected by the surveys to guide the design and delivery of local services. While modifications to the survey or […]

Our earlier blog described how you can identify the information needs of decision-makers and practitioners in your organisation, but, once these are established, how do you go about fulfilling them using ASCS and PSS SACE data? There are a number of strategies that you can use to ensure the data you collect from the surveys can […]

The Care Act 2014 outlines the responsibilities of local authorities (LAs) to provide outcomes focused services and encourages them to use national, as well as local, sources of service-user feedback, such as the Adult Social Care Outcomes Framework (ASCOF), to guide the design and delivery of local services. The data from the adult social care […]

The Adult Social Care Outcomes Framework (ASCOF) provides local authorities (LAs) with robust information that can be used at a local and regional level to guide the design and delivery of local outcomes-focused services (see Table 1). While a number of indicators in the ASCOF are currently populated by data from the Adult Social Care […]

The Adult Social Care Survey (ASCS) and Personal Social Services Survey of Adult Carers in England (PSS SACE or SACE, more commonly known as the Carers Survey) are conducted by all local authorities with adult social care responsibilities as part of their annual data returns to NHS Digital. As both surveys are conducted on large […]

Building personalised and outcomes-focused services and support for adult service users and carers is not an easy task, and the local authority (LA) staff involved in the design and delivery of local services require robust and good quality information to guide their decision-making. In particular, on who their service-users and carers are, and how they […]