Evidence and outcomes resources: Older people
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We have sourced some helpful links for organisations working with older people. You may find these useful in planning and carrying out your outcomes data collection, or in understanding the evidence base for your model. The advice includes:
- Existing research and evidence in your sector to help you establish what evidence already exists. This will help you understand the extent to which you need to collect outcomes data yourself, or how rigorous your methodology needs to be.
- Guidance to help you design suitable outcomes or indicators to evaluate your service or programme.
- Existing outcomes frameworks and data collection tools developed by academics or leading charities in the field. The benefit of using an existing framework or measure is that you don’t have to spend time and money developing your own, and you can be more confident in the quality. The downside is that it is not tailored to your organisation, so some outcomes or data collection tools may not be suitable for your context or the people you work with.
Please note that these resources were not identified through an exhaustive review.
Research and evidence
Resource |
Description |
| Living longer: evidence cards | A set of evidence cards summarising the key stats and context around England’s ageing population through engaging and accessible infographics (Centre for Ageing Better, 2021).
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| The state of ageing in 2020 | A snapshot of ageing today and in the future, focusing on work, housing, health and communities and how they affect people’s lives (Centre for Ageing Better, 2020).
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| Reports and briefings by Age UK | A range of reports and briefings on: active communities, care and support, equality and human rights, health and wellbeing (including loneliness), money matters and being safe at home (Age UK).
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Guidance
Resource |
Description |
| Evaluation guidance | A set of resources to support age-friendly evaluation (Centre for Ageing Better)
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| Guides to research and evaluation with older people | Guidance and information to help you conduct research and evaluation (Age UK).
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| Measuring the impact of loneliness later in later life | A guide to choosing and using a scale to measure the impact of your services on loneliness in older age (Campaign to End Loneliness).
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Frameworks and data collection tools
Resource |
Description |
| Measuring ageing: An introduction to the Ageing Better Measures Framework | A compendium of 63 measures, survey scales and their associated data sources looking at outcomes at the individual level related to ageing and later life (Centre for Ageing Better, 2019).
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| Outcomes Framework for Older People and Adult Community Services to improve health, wellbeing and maintain independence. | A local ‘framework’ for measuring outcomes in a way which places emphasis on the patient experience and clinical outcomes, but still takes account of the process of service delivery (Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Clinical Commissioning Group, 2014).
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| Index of Wellbeing in Later Life | Tool incorporating multiple indicators of wellbeing in a single measure, with a focus on objective as well as subjective aspects of life and wellbeing (Age UK, 2017).
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| LEAF-7 | Tool measuring a person’s quality of life and changes occurring over time (Age UK Wakefield District, 2016).
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| ICEpop CAPability measure for older people (ICECAP-O) | A measure of capability in older people for use in economic evaluation. The measure covers attributes of wellbeing that were found to be important to older people in the UK (University of Birmingham).
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| Lawton-Brody instrumental activities of daily living scale (IADL) | Assessment of functional status in older adults with a questionnaire that needs to be filled out by a carer or other professional (Lawton and Brody, 1969, cited in Coyne, 2019).
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| Warwick Edinburgh Mental Wellbeing Scale (WEMWBS) | Tool (14 or 7 item scale) that can be used with older people to measure wellbeing.
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These webpages have been adapted from the Inspiring Impact programme, which ran from 2011 until early 2022 and supported voluntary organisations to improve their impact practice. More information about the Inspiring Impact programme.
