A social prescribing approach to lower limb care

Hello, my name is Dr Rachel Stowe and I'm a GP working in a practice that benefits from the Lindsay Leg Club. Venous disease is common in our population, it's a huge burden for those patients suffering from it and it also takes up many resources in the NHS. Patients with venous disease often have reduced mobility, are isolated and lonely and often feel very disempowered and they often have multiple other comorbidities. The traditional model of general practice struggles to cope with the needs of this population and actually this is where we see the models such the Lindsay Lead Club really coming into force. In the Lindsay Lead Club model there's the opportunity to address some of these factors such as loneliness by social prescribing, the opportunity to self-educate to help patients to manage themselves and feel that they are doing something that's of worth to themselves. The opportunity to also proactively tackle some of the other long-term conditions that the patient may be suffering from. It's a fantastic model and we should be thinking about adopting it in many other areas of the NHS.