Professionals: Request support for a patient
You can request support online for a patient or client's needs under the NHS and Community Care Act.
- If your concern is of a safeguarding nature you should refer to the safeguarding process for professionals.
- If your concern is for an assessment under the Mental Health Act you should refer to the Approved Mental Health Professional Service (AMHP).
About your patient's needs
Patients with low level support needs
If your patient is not eligible for support from adult social care and requires more low level support to reduce isolation, deprivation and falls, please refer to advice and guidance on remaining independent and accessing organisations in the community.
Patients with difficulty managing day-to-day activities
If your patient is finding it hard to manage day-to-day activities at home due to a physical, mental or sensory impairment, illness or old age, please submit a referral to Occupational Therapy (OT). An OT assessment will help your patient to live more independently at home.
Patients in an unpaid caring role
If your patient looks after someone with support needs, you can refer them for a carer's assessment. This will look at what support they need in their role as carer and how we can help. Find out more about carer's assessments and how to refer.
Patients with eligible support needs
If your patient is eligible for support from adult social care a support enquiry will help us decide what the next steps should be. You can submit a support enquiry online below.
You can only refer patients within the Liverpool local authority area. If your patient lives outside the Liverpool area, please refer to the appropriate local authority.
Before you start a support enquiry
If you don’t already have an online social care portal account, you must register first before submitting a referral.
- As part of the registration process, we will send a security authentication code to your email address – we will do this each time you sign in.
- Once registered, you can complete a referral, or save and come back to it.
- Once you have an account you can use the same sign in details to submit other professional referral forms via the portal.
Once submitted, you can print off a copy for your records, if required.
We'll need to know some basic information about the patient, such as their name, address, date of birth, contact details and GP details. We'll also ask some questions about any health conditions and living and support arrangements.
The support enquiry should take no longer than 10 minutes to complete.
- As the professional making the referral, make sure you enter your contact details in the section 'Your Details (Portal User)'.
- Make sure you enter the details and contact information of the person you are referring in the section 'Who is the assessment for'.
Register or sign in to submit a support enquiry.
Read our privacy notice which tells you how we use your data
What happens next?
The support enquiry will be triaged and we may contact you for more information, if needed. We aim to make contact with the patient within 10 working days.
Advocacy
If you think the patient would benefit from an advocate to act on their behalf, find out how to get support from an advocate.