This is the second year of the reducing stress and distress improvement programme. Participating teams will be supported to identify and test improvement ideas during a 12-month programme.
Delivery
We will run two cohorts (Cohorts 5 and 6) of our programme in 2026 starting in April and July.
Each cohort will include a mix of care home and hospital teams from across Scotland. You will be allocated to one of the cohorts. Healthcare Improvement Scotland will lead on supporting hospital teams and the Care Inspectorate will lead on supporting care home teams.
Months one to six
The programme will be divided into two phases of six-month duration. All learning sessions are interactive. Teams will be expected to achieve key milestones and participate in programme activity during each phase.
During months one to six, all teams will receive monthly one-to-one coaching calls (5 virtual with a minimum of 1 in-person site visit).
Monthly quality improvement learning sessions will be held virtually.
Key activities to be completed by all participating teams are:
- Month 1: Complete your self-evaluation tool.
- Month 2: Agree your improvement priorities.
- Month 3: Understand your system using quality improvement (QI) tools.
- Month 4: Develop your aim statement and collect data.
- Month 5: Develop and test your change idea.
- Month 6: Continue testing and share progress of your change idea.
Months seven to 12
During months seven to 12, teams will receive:
- one-to-one virtual coaching calls every second month
- Group virtual learning sessions alternating month, and
- celebration virtual webinar: feedback from all teams
Key activities to be completed by all participating teams are:
- continue to identify and test ideas and collect relevant data
- spread and sustaining improvements, and
- share learning.
If you would like a PDF of the application information and frequently asked questions documents, please email us at his.focusondementia@nhs.scot.
Support for teams
Joining the improvement programme gives care home and hospital teams access to:
- support to self-evaluate current practice and identify improvement priorities
- learning sessions and one-to-one coaching support over a 12-month period to implement improvement activity
- an extensive range of resources and toolkits, and
- a national learning network of teams across Scotland for peer support and sharing learning.
During the 12-month programme, our improvement advisors will support you to:
- create the conditions for improvement
- understand your current system
- identify, plan and test a change
- capture data and measurement for improvement
- identify when to implement and scale change, and
- share learning.
Dates for learning sessions
The following dates and times are schedule for learning sessions for Cohort 5.
- Month 1: Tuesday 21 April 2026, 2-3.30pm
- Month 2: Tuesday 19 May 2026, 2–3.30pm
- Month 3: Tuesday 16 June 2026, 2–3.30pm
- Month 4: Tuesday 21 July 2026, 2–3.30pm
- Month 5: Tuesday 18 August 2026, 2–3.30pm
- Month 6: Tuesday 22 September 2026, 2–3.30pm
- Month 7: One-to-one coaching session: date and time to be arranged between lead coach and teams – 30 minutes.
- Month 8: Group learning session: Topic to be determined by cohort: Tuesday 17 November 2026, 2-3pm
- Month 9: One-to-one coaching session: date and time to be arranged between lead coach and teams – 30 minutes.
- Month 10: Group learning session: Topic to be determined by cohort: Tuesday 19 January 2027, 2–3pm
- Month 11: One-to-one coaching session: Date and time to be arranged between lead coach and teams – 30 minutes.
- Month 12: Group learning session: Topic to be determined by cohort: Tuesday 16 March 2027, 2–3pm
These are the dates and times for learning sessions for Cohort 6.
- Month 1: Tuesday 14 July 2026, 2pm – 3.30pm
- Month 2: Tuesday 11 August 2026, 2–3.30pm
- Month 3: Tuesday 15 September 2026, 2–3.30pm
- Month 4: Tuesday 13 October 2026, 2–3.30pm
- Month 5: Tuesday 10 November 2026, 2–3.30pm
- Month 6: Tuesday 8 December 2026, 2–3.30pm
- Month 7: One-to-one coaching session: Date and time to be arranged between lead coach and teams – 30 minutes
- Month 8: minute Group learning session: Topic to be determined by cohort: Tuesday 9 February 2026, 2–3pm
- Month 9: One-to-one coaching session: Date and time to be arranged between lead coach and teams – 30 minutes.
- Month 10: Group learning session: Topic to be determined by cohort: Tuesday 20 April 2027, 2–3pm
- Month 11: One-to-one coaching session: Date and time to be arranged between lead coach and teams – 30 minutes.
- Month 12: Group learning session: Topic to be determined by cohort: Tuesday 8 June 2027, 2–3pm
Sharing learning
We will capture evidence and learning from improvement activity. We plan to share this with our networks to support wider spread. We will do this by:
- hosting a small number of webinars
- publishing learning summaries
- publishing progress updates
- publishing case studies