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QPM | National Development Team for Inclusion

QPM | National Development Team for Inclusion

Tag: Advocacy

Are you passionate about improving independent Advocacy?

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We are looking for independent, freelance assessors to join our Advocacy Quality Performance Mark (QPM) assessor team. The QPM is the UK’s independent quality performance mark for organisations providing all types of statutory and non-statutory independent advocacy. Our assessors have significant experience and knowledge of the best practice delivery of independent advocacy and the broader Health and Social Care Sector; they understand advocacy providers’ unique and essential role in upholding people’s rights and enabling people’s voices to be heard.

The QPM is a supportive and developmental process. As an assessor, you will need a good understanding of organisational development and be able to communicate strengths and areas for improvement clearly. If you are passionate about people accessing high-quality, independent advocacy and want to be a part of the team ensuring QPM standards continue to be met, inspire and drive improvement, we would love to hear from you.

In order to ensure that assessments are impartial and that conflicts of interest are minimised, QPM assessors are not directly involved in currently providing advocacy services. If you would like to know more about this role or have any questions, please get in touch with our Advocacy Lead and QPM Manager, Gail Petty, via advocacy@ndti.org.uk

We value diversity
We are passionate about ensuring our people reflect the communities we work with. We are taking positive action to address a current under-representation within our workforce and particularly welcome expressions of interest in free-lance work from disabled people and people from black and ethnic backgrounds.

In expressing an interest, we ask that you complete our online Equality and Diversity Monitoring form, which will help us in our journey to create a diverse and inclusive organisation. The form is not compulsory, and the information you share will be anonymous. The form can be accessed and completed online here.

Ready to apply?
The Assessor Role Profile can be found here and Expression of Interest Form can be found here. We ask that your completed application is submitted to advocacy@ndti.org.uk 

We will close the opportunity when we have recruited enough people. To find out more about the QPM, please visit our dedicated website at www.qualityadvocacy.org.uk. 

Guest Blog: The Mental Capacity Maze

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Jane Kingston, Senior Advocacy Coordinator at  Advocacy Centre North asks the question “Can future planning be a Best Interest Serious Medical Treatment if it’s not time and decision specific?”

Maze

As advocates we welcome approaches from professionals to involve our services. However, there are some unusual expectations on the advocacy role.  A recent request to an advocacy service for IMCA support with NHS Emergency Health and Care Plans (EHCP) has opened a debate in the sector to ensure we are all compliant with the principles of the Mental Capacity Act. EHCP documents and  the step by step care needed during and after an anticipated emergency, makes communication easier in the event of a healthcare emergency (this accompanies rather than replaces a DNAR order).

So, we all know that an IMCA is instructed for Best Interest decisions over Serious Medical Treatments. A Best Interest decision applies to a person assessed as lacking the mental capacity to decide themselves in a specific situation (after practicable steps have been taken to support them making their own decision) and it must be time and decision specific. So, by definition this makes a future care plan difficult to define as time and decision-specific Serious Medical Treatment, which is defined as:

treatment which involves giving new treatment, stopping treatment that has already started or withholding treatment that could be offered in circumstances where:

  • if a single treatment is proposed there is a fine balance between the likely benefits and the burdens to the patient and the risks involved
  • a decision between a choice of treatments is finely balanced, or
  • what is proposed is likely to have serious consequences for the patient.

Some advocacy services take such referrals and others do not. This request is throwing up the following questions:

  • Can a plan which relates to future decisions be compliant with the Mental Capacity Act, will it allow for fluctuations in capacity or changes in a person’s condition and ability to make their own future decision?
  • Will the NHS Emergency Health and Care Plan be classed in the same way the Mental Capacity Act supports IMCA involvement for Do Not Attempt Resuscitation (DNAR) cases?

We’d love to hear your thoughts and get the debate flowing – please share this article or send your thoughts to advocacy@ndti.org.uk and jane.kingston@cvsnewcastle.org.uk

2022 QPM | National Development Team for Inclusion