ECINS are proud to be working with Clouds End CIC to enable multi-agency support for people who suffer from hoarding disorder or chronic disorganisation @WMHDay #WorldMentalHealthDay
Heather Matuozzo, Director of Clouds End CIC said “Hoarding can be a mental health issue and the long-awaited announcement in August from the World Health Organisation (WHO) that Hoarding is now to be recognised as a mental health disorder will bring about much-needed changes in approaches to supporting a person who hoards.
“I have worked with the subject of hoarding for many years and formed Clouds End CIC following an emotive experience working as a ‘de-clutterer’, when I realised there was little or no help available for people affected by hoarding disorder. Clouds End is not just for individuals to get help but also social services, housing associations, landlords, Clinical Commissioning groups and, in fact, anyone who needs to tackle hoarding situations that are creating problems.
“Until now there has been no dedicated solution to support people who hoard and I am pleased to be working with Empowering-Communities to help provide an end to end process that assists in the management of hoarding referrals and in supporting vulnerable people.
“Service providers and agencies are all asking for multi-agency work to be able to help those with hoarding issues by putting the right people in touch with each other at the right time to deal with the issue in a sensitive yet effective way. Often people who hoard do not realise they have a problem and agencies have to collaborate and work together to help people find a solution.
“Journey mapping an individual who has hoarding issues also helps agencies to better understand the triggers, what support they did or didn’t have and how they can begin to address wider support for this mental health condition.
“One of the key advantages of the ECINS solution is the trackability of progress. Being able to work with an individual, assessing where they are at the point of first contact and where they have come at various stages throughout the support process is hugely beneficial. ECINS’ multi-agency case management system, ECINS, has a built-in Wheel Assessment that enables agencies to see the bigger picture, tracking and monitoring progress, identifying trends and statistics so that it’s possible to see how many interventions have been made, what support has been put in place and when, what works and what doesn’t. Without this, many agencies would simply make visit after visit without being able to evidence any progress and without getting the right support for an individual.
“Another benefit is the fact that any agencies that should be, or want to be, involved can be. There are no user licences and no limits on who can be involved. This encourages full participation from agencies and support groups to provide real multi-agency support and agencies can see who is involved, giving them a wider support network of their own and their own ‘go to’ directory to get advice and provide joined-up support.
“Every so often there’s a big drive to address the issue of hoarding. Now with the WHO’s announcement there has never been a better time to push it much harder and really get to grips with the issue. All the time I hear people asking for a way of working with tenants, to measure and show progress whilst maintaining communication within the multi-agency group. Now with the ECINS solution we can.
