Accelerating digital transformation in social care: East Riding Council’s DREaMS initiative

East Riding Council established the Digital Record Enabling and Management Support (DREaMS) Team to drive the digital transformation of over 1000 social care providers across the Humber and North Yorkshire region.

With a mission to assess and uplift digital maturity, the team offered tailored support including guidance on accessing funding from NHS England. However, their efforts were constrained by fragmented data, manual processes, and limited visibility into their impact. To overcome these challenges, the council partnered with Local Partnerships to develop a robust data and reporting solution that would enhance efficiency, insight, and long-term strategic value.

Client requirements

The Digital Record Enabling and Management Support Team (DREaMS Team) at East Riding Council assesses over 1000 care providers on their current digital capabilities and provides practical support for enhancement. For example, signposting care providers to funding available from NHS England and other sources.

However, the capacity and effectiveness of the team was hindered by a lack of insight into the effectiveness of their work and a lack of readily available, robust data. Reporting was time consuming as the team relied on various spreadsheets and manual processes. As a result, the team required a partner to help improve their data processes and develop a solution to improve their effectiveness.

How we supported the council

The Data & Analytics team addressed the data quality and reporting issues by:

• Establishing consistent data processes and definitions
• Designing and implementing a cloud-based, end-to-end data solution
• Cleaning and migrating the team’s historical data
• Hosting and maintaining the tool
• Supporting implementation and adoption through workshops and iterative design

Additionally, based on the insight and data available, we will support the council in developing an end-of-programme report, to provide evidence of the effectiveness of the service to NHS England.

Impact

As a result of our work:

• The council has made efficiencies through the digitisation of the their data collection and reporting process, enabling the team to focus more of their time with social care providers
• Reporting and insight has enabled the team to focus their work on those care settings benefiting most from the team’s support to improve their digital maturity

• The team has been able to demonstrate strategic effectiveness of the DREaMS team to senior stakeholders including NHS England and the Department of Health, enabling it to secure additional funding

• The digital capability of care settings is accelerated, enabling them to provide higher quality and more client-centred care to residents in the North East

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