Social Prescribing
Core Outcomes for Social Prescribing
Article title: Identifying social prescribing core outcomes using a Delphi approach: findings and future directions
Key concepts:
Social prescribing: A social service that helps connect people with non-medical community services and supports — such as exercise programs, social groups, food supports, or housing resources — to improve health and wellbeing.
Delphi study: A research method that gathers feedback from a group of people using multiple rounds of surveys to help build agreement on important topics or priorities.
Study aims: To identify the most important outcomes that should be measured in future studies and evaluations of social prescribing, and to better understand which outcomes matter most to people involved in or affected by social prescribing.
What we did: We conducted a two-round online Delphi study with people from across Canada with different experiences and perspectives related to social prescribing, including healthcare providers, researchers, community organizations, older adults, family members, and friends. In each round, participants reviewed and rated a list of possible outcomes that could be used to evaluate social prescribing programs.
What we found: Participants identified seven outcomes that are especially important for use in studies and evaluations of social prescribing. These outcomes mainly focused on mental health, social connectedness, physical functioning, and overall wellbeing. Participants also highlighted the importance of considering factors such as equity, access to resources and services, and how care is delivered when studying and evaluating social prescribing programmes. The findings provide an important starting point for improving consistency in how social prescribing programmes are studied and evaluated in future research and practice
Community Connectors’ Experiences in Social Prescribing
Article full title: Looking Back and Moving Forward: Exploring Community Connectors’ Experience With Implementing Social Prescribing
Key concepts: Social prescribing is a service that helps connect people with non-medical community services and supports — such as exercise programs, social groups, food supports, or housing resources — to improve health and wellbeing. Community connectors (sometimes called link workers) help guide people to these services and supports based on their individual needs and goals.
Study aims: To better understand how community connectors experience their role in social prescribing programmes, including what supports their work and what challenges they face in practice.
What we did: We interviewed community connectors working within a social prescribing programme about their experiences in the role. Participants described how they connected people to community services and supports, how their role worked in everyday practice, and what helped or made their work more difficult. We then analyzed the interviews to identify common ideas and experiences across participants.
What we found: Community connectors described playing an important role in helping people access community services and supports that could improve their health and wellbeing. Participants shared positive experiences, such as building trusting relationships and seeing meaningful improvements in people’s lives. However, they also described challenges, including unclear role expectations, heavy workloads, and broader system-level barriers that made the programme more difficult to implement consistently.