Co-located health and social care services in Wales: What are the benefits to professionals?

Our study investigated two co-located learning disability services in Wales. The paper reports the views of professionals who were involved in planning the new services as well as of those who eventually worked in the services. Fourteen professionals from health, social care, voluntary service providers, and advocacy groups were interviewed over an 8-month period. The main focus of the investigation was on problems in establishing the co-located services, what the existing barriers to improved learning disabilities services are and how co-location may address these barriers. Respondents were positive about the dynamism that the service planning phase brought, but there was also a consensus that some aspects of multi-agency work across professional divides were outside the control of the new services. Overall, although there are clear benefits of co-location for professionals, co-locating services largely appear to be a missed opportunity on the way towards more integrated health and social care services in the learning disabilities sector. This raises questions about the usefulness of co-location as part of the integration policy agenda.