MORE than £5million worth of savings can be made through reorganising a rehab service for those recovering from a medical crisis, county councillors have been told.

Home care providers will be expected to take on the bulk of the work provided by the ‘reablement service’, which steps in to offer support after a hospital stay, serious fall or other disability.

Under the county council proposals, 80 full-time or part-time staff would be either redeployed elsewhere within the authority or offered voluntary redundancy.

So far 20 have already requested voluntary redundancy from the service, which has been struggling to provide seven-days-a-week cover.

Steve Gross, the council’s executive director for adults services, health and wellbeing, said in a report that currently just under 3,000 receive reablement support.

But an analysis of predicted demand has suggested that more than 7,000 should be taken care of – though there are moves afoot to merge reablement assessments with personal care assessments.

Several different alternatives have been considered, from the council’s commercial group continuing to deliver the service, to more delivery staff being take on, and the county council withdrawing completely.

It has been recommended, to Coun Tony Martin, the adult and community services cabinet member, that the latter be chosen when he examines the issue today.

Mr Gross added: “The options appraisal identified that there was the potential to generate £5.2million of net savings for the council through the implementation of a new delivery model, alongside increasing the numbers of people accessing reablement.”

The county council is confident that it can reduce the hourly rate for reablement services to £13, by relying on independent providers.