Research Review

Get Yourself Active Launches New Social Care Activity Pack

Get Yourself Active, a program led by Disability Rights UK and funded by Sport England, is proud to launch a new online pack designed for carers, support workers, and personal assistants who support people with disabilities and long-term health conditions. Designed in conjunction with experts in the social care and physical activity sectors including Durham University, Sport England, Sense, Sport for Confidence, Activity Alliance, Community integrated care and Mind, the pack aims to facilitate further disabled participation in physical activity by educating and empowering those who care to help disabled people get active in a way that suits them.

The pack was developed during the coronavirus pandemic when the inequality of physical activity hit the headlines. Sport England’s Active Lives Survey (2020) showed that only 47% of disabled people or those with a long-term health condition are active compared with 67% of those without. The reason that disabled people are more inactive than nondisabled people is most likely due to the barriers that they face in society. 

The decision to target carers and support workers seeks to address this imbalance due to their roles as essential and trusted messengers to those who they care for. Ultimately, if they understand more about the importance of physical activity and what is on offer then they will be better placed to support a disabled person to lead a more active life. 

The interactive pack offers practical help, tips, and advice that can be used to support disabled people to participate more in sport and physical activity. It is free and available online for all—designed to be shared and consumed with the sole purpose of breaking barriers to disabled participation in physical activity. The pack shows that there are many ways to be active which can be easily included in anyone’s daily routine. It also includes interactive worksheets that social care staff and the people they support can use to encourage conversations around the importance of physical activity and how they can make the next steps to live a more active life. 

Kamran Mallick, CEO of Disability Rights UK, says, “I am delighted to launch the Social Care Activity Pack. We all know that physical activity is hugely important to people’s health and mental wellbeing. We also have extensive evidence of the barriers to physical activity for disabled people—extending the health inequalities between disabled and nondisabled people.

“In our interviews with disabled people the message was clear, those who are inactive want to become active and those who are active want to be more active—an all mentioned the multiple barriers getting in the way of their plans to be active.

“DR UK’s Social Care Activity Pack offers a series of practical solutions to this problem. It tackles the barriers head-on and provides social workers, care staff, and family members with the knowledge and tools to become agents of change, supporting disabled people to realise their physical activity aspirations.”

Cecilia Kumar, head of disability at Sport England, says, “Prior to COVID-19, Sport England’s Active Lives survey showed a sustained increase in activity levels of disabled people. The pandemic has had a disproportionate impact on disabled people and people living with long-term health conditions, and we have seen that reflected in activity levels. That’s why tackling these inequalities is at the heart of Sport England’s strategy, Uniting the Movement.

“Research shows that people who provide support to disabled people or people living with long-term health conditions—such as family members, personal assistants, or support workers—can be key to unlocking the benefits of sport and physical activity. This online resource, developed by Disability Rights UK in partnership with social care and physical activity experts, will empower people to increase their knowledge and confidence around supporting disabled people to be active.”

Pack Contents
This pack is designed to be used as and when you need to find information about supporting people to be active. You do not have to read the whole pack at once and can move between sections depending on what information you need to find. We realise that all of this may not be relevant, as it all depends on your current knowledge and expertise.

At the end of each section, we have included some interactive worksheets that can help to solidify your learning and can help to get conversations started with the people you support.

This pack includes information on topics including the following:

• what is physical activity;

• how to have conversations about physical activity;

• ways to increase levels of physical activity; and

• ways to stay active.

Get Involved: Share and Promote

• Promote: Please share the pack via website articles, newsletters, or social media.
• Social Share: When sharing the resource on social media, please use our social tags @GetYrselfActive @DisRightsUK
• Feedback: Share your thoughts on the pack by filling in this survey, it shouldn’t take more than five minutes and will help us to ensure our resources are as high quality as possible.

Source: Disability Rights UK