The Potential Impact of Social Prescribing on Meaningful Engagement in Collective Aged Care Settings: Perspectives From the Global South

Background: Promoting collective care philosophies in residential aged care homes that enhances person-centred care remains a global challenge. More success is evident when an organisation’s approach to care impacts the well-being of everyone who lives and works in the home. However, funding systems are seldom applied in favour of a collective approach. The uptake of social prescribing is potential yet another obstacle in eradicating the prevailing dominance of the medical model of care in aged care homes.

Objective: In the Global South, institutionalised care is becoming a more acceptable and viable option to ensure health and well-being of older adults. Introducing person-centred care philosophies, such as the Eden Alternative (EA), in settings where care approaches are not predetermined by stringent funding schemes (i.e., related to addressing ‘challenging behaviours’ or specifying social prescribing), provides an opportunity to explore the intricacies of collective approaches. This project specifically considered how the EA philosophy impacted the quality of collective care within state-wide organisations in South Africa.

Methods: A qualitative, descriptive research design supported the investigation of four residential aged-care settings in South Africa. Ten focus groups, guided by the nominal group technique, were conducted with 68 participants, including residents, operational staff, and management staff. Quantitative and qualitative findings were deductively analysed using the EA’s domains of well-being as the guiding framework.

Results: The findings mostly indicated agreement between staff and residents on the positive contributions of the EA to support well-being associated with security, autonomy, identity, growth, connectedness, meaning and joy. Overall, security was the most prevalent theme and linked with needs for physical and emotional safety.

Conclusion: Partnerships with external bodies, such as the EA, could support cross-national learning and exchange to support stakeholders working more closely with government agencies in creating realistic and supportive operational and funding policies for collective long-term care settings.