Who is using PlaceCal?
======================

PlaceCal has already been rolled out in Hulme and Moss Side. Now it’s
being piloted in Moston.

PlaceCal is used by many different people in these communities, but a
few particular individuals find parts of their jobs are transformed by
using the platform.

Here are two key examples of people who are now benefiting from using
PlaceCal in their role already.

User 1: Alasdair, GP in Moss Side
---------------------------------

Alasdair is a GP at Moss Side Health Centre and he sees dozens of
patients a day. We would consider him an end user of PlaceCal.

Alasdair’s problem
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Many of Alasdair’s patients have problems with their breathing, aren’t
able to exercise, or are lonely.

His lonely patients are sometimes the most difficult to help, and he’s
only got 7 minutes in which to do it. For example, some patients call
for more than 40 ambulances a year to take them to hospital – just to
get the opportunity to see another human being.

This type of behaviour places an immense strain on the health services,
and sadly it doesn’t really fix the problem.

Alasdair knew what the solution was – but he lacked the infrastructure
for it.

Social prescription
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Alasdair wanted to `“socially
prescribe” <https://www.england.nhs.uk/personalised-health-and-care/social-prescribing/>`__.
This means he would refer people to services in their community instead
of only offering medical solutions. The services he could refer them to
might be a local group where they can do gentle exercise, or find some
social support.

1 in 5 GPs already socially prescribe, and 40% would refer if they had
more information about what’s available. (`July 2017, GP Online
Survey <https://www.england.nhs.uk/personalised-health-and-care/social-prescribing/>`__)

It’s was previously very difficult for Alasdair to find out more
information about what’s happening in Moss Side. The issue wasn’t a lack
of events going on, but the fact that there was no centralised place
where he could browse events. Many community groups don’t even have a
website.

Health workers have the job of maintaining sprawling spreadsheets or
emailing out PDF documents periodically. Unfortunately, these documents
have several drawbacks:

-  They get out of date very quickly
-  Many people are duplicating work or missing out key events
-  They aren’t easy to use in the 7 minute average GP’s appointment

How PlaceCal helps
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

PlaceCal is the perfect alternative to these cumbersome spreadsheets and
PDFs. Now Alasdair has access to PlaceCal, he can quickly pull up a
listing of everything going on in Moss Side for the next few weeks.
PlaceCal for Moss Side has hundreds of events listed at any one time.

.. figure:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/geeksforsocialchange/PlaceCal-Handbook/master/assets/placecal-sample-events-page.png
   :alt: Example of PlaceCal calendar

   Example of PlaceCal calendar

*Image caption: Example of the PlaceCal calendar*

The calendar can be displayed constantly on one of his computer screens
during his appointments. This means it now only takes about 30 seconds
for him to work with a patient to help them find one of the dozens of
events that take place every day.

As a result, Alasdair can now: \* Socially connect his patients to local
community events \* Enable people to find an alternative to taking more
medication \* Get people moving again after they may have been sedentary
for some time

.. figure:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/geeksforsocialchange/PlaceCal-Handbook/master/assets/alasdair-local-gp-moss-side.jpeg
   :alt: Alasdair using PlaceCal in his practice

   Alasdair using PlaceCal in his practice

*Image caption: Alasdair using the PlaceCal calendar in his practice*

:doc:`Find out more </commissioners/benefits>` *about what PlaceCal
offers social prescribers like Alasdair*

--------------

User 2: Patsy, Neighbourhood Health Worker in Manchester
--------------------------------------------------------

Patsy is a Neighbourhood Health Worker working for Buzz, Manchester’s
Health & Wellbeing service. Her role is to work people in Manchester
communities to improve their health and wellbeing. Patsy is an example
of someone who helps others to promote their events using PlaceCal.

.. figure:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/geeksforsocialchange/PlaceCal-Handbook/master/assets/buzz-logo.png
   :alt: Buzz – Manchester Health & Wellbeing Service

   Buzz – Manchester Health & Wellbeing Service

### Patsy’s problem

Part of Patsy’s job is `“asset
mapping” <http://www.brighterfuturestogether.co.uk/brighter-futures-together-toolkit/map-assets-in-your-community/>`__.
This means working with local community organisations to find out what
they have available, and keeping an up-to-date list of what’s going on.

She sends these listings to people she works with in the health service
– people like Alasdair, the GP we talked about in the previous section.

The existing tools Patsy had to work with all had their limitations.
They were spreadsheets that weren’t easy to keep current or share, and
local council websites that were hard to update and not really used by
anyone anyway.

.. _how-placecal-helps-1:

How PlaceCal helps
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Now by using PlaceCal, Patsy can train up organisations to input and
update their own event information. This creates a centralised
information source maintained by the people who own the events. Patsy
doesn’t have the endless struggle of chasing people to find out what’s
on anymore.

Organisations in the community are more digitally included by having
access to PlaceCal. They can reach more people for their events, so it
keeps everyone happy.

PlaceCal also reduces administration overhead for the area. It helps
Patsy to coordinate her work with other people doing asset mapping as
well, drastically reducing the amount of duplicate information held by
different organisations.

*Find out more about PlaceCal’s role in promoting*
:doc:`Digital Inclusion </commissioners/digital-inclusion>`.

Community groups using PlaceCal
-------------------------------

Patsy and Alasdair were examples of end users benefiting from the
PlaceCal platform. Now we’ll look at some of the community groups
promoting their events through PlaceCal.

Here are a few examples of setting up a new calendar in practice.

Example 1: Big Life Centres
---------------------------

Big Life Centres currently manages two health and wellbeing centres in
Hulme. These are the Kath Locke Centre and the Zion Centre.

The problem
~~~~~~~~~~~

Before becoming a PlaceCal partner, each venue already had a dedicated
staff member who would create a printed events listing every month.
However, neither hosted the information on their website. They weren’t
reaching as many people in the community as they would have liked.

How PlaceCal helped
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

We came along with the aim of helping Big Life Centres to set up a brand
new events calendar for both venues that we could import into the
PlaceCal system.

First, we created a calendar for each venue using Microsoft Outlook. One
calendar contained every Kath Locke centre event, and the second
calendar had the Zion Centre events.

Since all the events for each centre were held on the same premises, we
didn’t necessarily have to use the Location field in Outlook. All we had
to do was set the location in PlaceCal at the same time as we imported
the events.

In the end, we decided to use the Outlook Location field to store each
event’s room number, because these were large buildings. Every event can
now display an accurate location and room number with minimum effort
from the Admins.

The outcome
~~~~~~~~~~~

The Big Life Centres now have one combined events listing for every
event in both centres, and they also maintain separate directories for
each venue.

It’s much easier for the Admins to list their events and, by ensuring a
wide coverage, they are attracting more members of the community to
their centres than ever.

Example 2: Hulme Community Garden Centre
----------------------------------------

Hulme Community Garden Centre brings the local community together
through gardening through providing free access to education and skills
training.

.. _the-problem-1:

The problem
~~~~~~~~~~~

Hulme Community Garden Centre were using Facebook to list their big
public events like gardening festivals and open days. This was working
well, but it meant that people following them on Facebook were
struggling to find the right information since it was hard for them to
list their smaller events.

.. _how-placecal-helped-1:

How PlaceCal helped
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

They were already using Google’s GSuite tools, and so we helped them
create a second calendar using Google Calendar. They shared this
calendar with every staff member for their weekly events, which included
regular groups like home education lessons, and groups for people with
learning difficulties.

We imported both of these calendars into PlaceCal, along with the
Facebook events. This approach means that they can still use Facebook to
promote their big events, while publishing comprehensive listings on
PlaceCal. A bonus is that they can list every event from both Facebook
and Google Calendar together on PlaceCal.

.. _the-outcome-1:

The outcome
~~~~~~~~~~~

Hulme Community are now attracting more people to their smaller events,
and they haven’t had to use anymore new software. It’s easier for their
staff to organise their groups and communicate the information to their
attendees.

Example 3: The Old Abbey Taphouse
---------------------------------

The Old Abbey Taphouse use Facebook for all their events due to the
great sharing features in Facebook, as they mostly host events for other
people that already use Facebook. Facebook allows people to create
events and then link them to their Facebook Page afterwards, so all the
venue has to do is approve the events. PlaceCal reads directly from
Facebook so no further configuration is needed.