Community Integrated Care is one of Britain’s biggest social care providers, offering services across England and Scotland. Our charity was founded in Widnes almost 30 years ago, and we remain the biggest care provider in the area.
Widnes Vikings play in Europe’s elite rugby league competition and are the focal point of the local community. If you’re from Widnes or its neighbouring town, Runcorn, chances are you’ll support them. By partnering with such a well-loved brand in our hometown community, we’ve been able to give the people we support special experiences and reward our dedicated colleagues.
At the heart of this partnership is an exciting core programme. Every week, people we support who have learning disabilities, mental health concerns or autism have the opportunity to take part in accessible sports sessions with specialist coaches. Residents in our dementia care homes enjoy weekly reminiscence and activity sessions with community coaches and legends of the club. Our colleagues can access free sports and healthy living sessions. We also host a special dementia cafe that draws together people living with dementia and carers from across the community. The club, and its current and past players, are very much rooted in our local services and community engagement efforts.
Beyond this, many other brilliant things have been achieved through two organisations that are committed to making a social impact and finding a shared purpose together.
Genuine giants of the game have engaged with our dementia care programmes – it’s been awe-inspiring to see people recognise their heroes from bygone eras and reconnect with their rugby league memories. We’ve had legends such as George Nicholls – winner of a World Cup and many domestic competitions – spend time with people we support. In football terms, that’s like having Sir Bobby Charlton volunteer in a Manchester care home.
The club wants to create opportunities for people we support, so is supporting them to volunteer in meaningful and exciting roles. For instance, the club has trained Will, who has autism, to become a coach at the club that he passionately supports. They’ve also introduced us to their partner businesses to help us create supported employment opportunities with them too.
Together, we’ve actively celebrated our work and this has served to support a more inclusive community. When people from our charity were invited to a big Super League game as guests of honour, the fans were incredibly warm and welcoming. This spirit continued when we asked fans to donate old memorabilia so we could create special Vikings memory boxes for people living with dementia. We were inundated with donations. People gave items of both actual and sentimental value – from prized autograph collections to song sheets from glorious cup days of the past.
And in return, we’re doing our bit too. We’re looking forward to delivering dementia training to the entire staff team at the Vikings and have been keen to share our talents and expertise too.
We’re proud to be doing something exciting and different together. We recently had the honour of receiving two top accolades at the Third Sector Care Awards and being shortlisted as a finalist at the National Dementia Care Awardsfor our work’s innovation and impact.
We were delighted to recently welcome Sharon Allen, CEO of Skills for Care, to see the project firsthand. She said: “The relationship the club has with Community Integrated Care is brilliant. I hope Widnes Vikings can be a trailblazer and encourage other clubs to do similar things, because sport can bring a community together.”
The best support often sees people and colleagues enjoying their passions together and sharing mutually fulfilling days. By enabling our staff and people we support to get closer to the club they love, we’ve been able to make this happen.
Content on this page is produced and controlled by Skills for Care, sponsor of the Guardian Social Care Network leadership, learning and development hub
