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HSE Community Work Department

The HSE Community Work Department for Cork South worked with over a hundred community organisations, groups and associations based in Cork City and Cork County in addition to statutory organisations and institutions throughout Covid.

Siel Bleu at Home

On March 16th 2020, Siel Bleu Ireland ceased delivery of 100% of our services due to the restriction

Creativity in Older Age 2021

This project proposal centres on supporting positive ageing groups in communities in Kildare to explore, discuss and question artworks from the Kildare County Council Municipal Art Collection, through gentle, but structured conversation.

FitLine

FitLine is a volunteer-led telephone-based motivation line, aimed at people aged 50+, which encourages callers to get more active.

SeniorLine

SeniorLine is Ireland’s national listening service for older people, the service delivered by 180 trained older volunteers. SeniorLine is open every day of the year, Freefone number 1800 80 45 91. 18,000+ calls received in 2020.

CONNECT Project

100 people were supplied with an assistive listening device (including an extension microphone to facilitate social distancing where required) to support them in communicating with family, friends and neighbours.

Artist in Residence in Care Settings – A LIFE OF WORK in story, song and dance

The project is work with the older people who frequent the Naas Day Care Centre in or to co-design and deliver a series of online dance and arts based activities, through which to enable participants to engage, explore and respond to the theme of work – leading to a celebration of personal work related experiences in story, song and dance.

Age Friendly Fingal Guide 2021

Age Friendly Guide 2021 to include information such as Health & Wellbeing, Local information & Supports, History & Poetry, Age Friendly Quizzes, Recipes, Puzzles and lots more

Reaching out to Older People -Staying Connected

This initiative allowed for the purchase of Acorn smart tablets which were configured to support internet access needs of older people. Digital adoption is a significant challenge for many older adults and consequently this has limited the effectiveness of the public and commercial sectors that endeavour to serve them. Age related accessibility and design limitations, digital literacy and attitudes to technology are key contributors to this reluctance to embrace digital. As public and commercial services are moving online to increase efficiencies and reduce costs, the digital divide is increasing. Those not connected are becoming more socially and economically isolated. Isolation and loneliness have a proven causal impact on health and wellbeing. The ACORN is a smart tablet based solution, purpose-built to solve this problem through facilitation and simplified digital adoption for senior citizens. It achieves this through age-friendly, accessible design, interactive help tools and content tailored to the user. It offers easy access to the online world of communication and commerce. The company supplying the ACORN tablets provides customisation of each tablet for the user, they add local content and links that are of relevance to each user. Once the links are built in they can be added dynamically i.e. even after the users have received the ACORN. It will update automatically.

Live Longer and Prosper

Live Longer and Prosper is a wrap around service aimed at Older People in the community. The programme was initiative in 2018 after a consultation session with Older people regarding what services and activities they would like to engage with . the feedback from Older People pointed to a multi activity / services programme which would not only allow Older People to gain more skills prevalent to their age but also do this in a fun and interactive manner where they could meet other older people and build a social circle or extend their social circle. Hence, Live Longer and Prosper was designed to encompass practical skills and activities and information and social benefits. the programme delivers the following elements to all the participants (this year the programme was hosted on line – in order to support this older people were given tablets and taught how to use them on a one to one basis and in group sessions held on line and through the telephone) Healthy Eating course for older people on a budget, physical exercise programmes, dementia awareness course, know your rights, keeping safe Garda talks, introduction to services e.g befriending and visitation services, grow your own sustainable gardening course and other talks as requested by the participants. The group usually meet up but through covid they have been meeting in small groups online and have learned to use technology through this new approach.

Connecting the Faithful

A Newsletter incorporating fun, interesting items including exercise suggestions, Seasonal recipe’s, Puzzle’s, word Searches, and Library articles

South Dublin together and Booklet of Hope

Two activity booklets. South Dublin together was a Mayors initiative for our outgoing mayor in June 2020. The booklet of hope was through the keep well campaign in partnership with South Dublin sports partnership and south Dublin county partnership limited

Its Good to Talk GAA

Current and former Monaghan GAA stars volunteered to call older people who were cocooning during the level 5 restrictions during March-May 2020.

Healthy Home Project

A holistic approach to wellbeing incorporating Befriending, Meals on Wheels with a view to broadening this service to support people to remain in their own homes