ECINS’ Heather Ette spoke with Sergeant Mick Thorpe, Peterborough, Cambridgeshire Constabulary

HE: How have you been using ECINS for your work with Vulnerable Adults?

MT: A very important area we have been using ECINS for is vulnerable adults.  We get incidents where officers are called to a house and find people living with no electricity and no food.  Our officers complete a referral form which is sent to a centralised unit for them to assess and send on to mental health, social care and other relevant agencies.   A gap in this process is that once we send on that referral form we don’t know what actions are being carried out by the agencies or when.  This means either myself or other officers continue to visit the vulnerable adult to check on their progress which often prompts repeat referrals being made.

If the partner agencies are ECINS users they can record the referrals and update the system so that we know that actions are being carried out.  As some partner agencies are not yet on board with ECINS we upload our referral form to ECINS and when we reach a maximum of 3 forms submitted for the same individual we chase it up directly with the most relevant partner agency.

By using ECINS in this way we can ensure we are aware internally if an individual is a repeat victim and evidence the type of call out and actions we have carried out to try to get them support.