Supporting people to live healthier lives
Are people encouraged and supported to manage their own health and wellbeing?
In brief
Supporting people to live healthier lives is key line of enquiry 3 under the Effective key question in the Care Quality Commission (CQC) draft adult social care assessment framework (v9, 19 March 2026), currently published for consultation. It covers health and well-being deterioration and prevention, supporting access to healthcare services (for example, gp, dentists, audiology, speech and language therapy, dieticians), healthier lives promotion (including physical activity, healthy diets), keeping well and managing risks in hot or cold weather. CQC describes performance against it at four rating levels: Outstanding, Good, Requires improvement and Inadequate. Each statement and rating characteristic quoted here is reproduced verbatim from CQC's draft; plain-English summaries are HLTH's own.
- Key question
- Effective
- Line of enquiry
- KLOE 3 of 4 under Effective
- Rating levels
- Outstanding, Good, Requires improvement, Inadequate
- Source
- Adult social care assessment framework, v9 (19 March 2026)
- Status
- Draft, published by CQC for consultation
- Reference
- pp. 27–29 of the CQC draft
Scope and topic areas
What this line of enquiry covers
Scope of this key line of enquiry and topic areas include:
- Health and well-being deterioration and prevention
- Supporting access to healthcare services (for example, GP, dentists, audiology, speech and language therapy, dieticians)
- Healthier lives promotion (including physical activity, healthy diets)
- Keeping well and managing risks in hot or cold weather
Rating characteristics
How CQC describes each rating
The four characteristic sets for this KLOE, best to worst. Every point is CQC's wording, reproduced exactly.
Outstanding
In plain terms: Care is exceptional and consistently better than the Good standard.
- There are established systems within the service that actively support staff by sharing and embedding learning to make sure people have good health and well-being outcomes that exceed expectations, leading to an outstanding quality of life.
- People are empowered to make healthier, informed choices and the service works with them to monitor the impact. Equity and inclusion are prioritised, so that support to live healthier lives creatively adapts to diverse needs.
- Where people have complex or continued health and care needs, staff seek innovative and evidence-based ways to help them lead healthier lives and continuously improve. Links with health and social care services are excellent, encouraging other providers to follow this partnership model.
- There is a deliberate focus on health improvement to ensure that care goes beyond meeting clinical or care needs.
- There is an embedded culture where staff understand the importance of health promotion and are empowered to implement innovative practices that promote healthier lives and independence. Any learning is shared internally and externally.
Good
In plain terms: The service meets the expected standard.
- People are supported to manage their health, care and wellbeing needs by staff who understand their needs and preferences. They are empowered to set goals and achieve what is important to them to stay as healthy and as independent as possible.
- People are supported to be as involved as possible in monitoring and reviewing their own physical and mental health and wellbeing needs. This includes taking part in regular reviews with the service and, where appropriate, being supported to engage in health checks with other health and social care professionals.
- People are encouraged and supported to make healthier choices relating to diet, lifestyle, physical activity, personal and oral hygiene.
- Risks to people’s health and wellbeing are identified and support to prevent deterioration is prioritised. This includes understanding specific risks for a person due to their needs and specific health conditions, keeping well in hot and cold weather and supporting people to remain as active and mobile as possible.
- The service works with people who use services and professionals to plan and enable access to health and social care support to achieve good health and wellbeing outcomes. This includes facilitating reasonable adjustments, supporting people to access health checks or to complete healthcare passports.
- The service progresses any relevant advice or recommendations made by other professionals or commissioners to prevent deterioration in health and well-being and avoidable hospital admissions.
Requires improvement
In plain terms: The service is not yet Good and has areas that must improve.
- People are not routinely involved or do not have choice and control in managing their own health and wellbeing needs, where this is possible.
- Risks to people’s health and wellbeing are missed or not identified in a timely way, so avoidable deterioration is not always prevented.
- There is a limited focus on prevention and promoting healthier lives; people are not consistently encouraged and supported to make healthier choices.
- The service does not consistently support people to access health checks or other additional services to improve their health or wellbeing or does not consistently do so at the right time.
- Advice and recommendations made by other professionals are not consistently sought or followed.
Inadequate
In plain terms: Performance is well below the expected standard; enforcement may follow.
- People are not supported to stay healthy and independent.
- Opportunities to improve health and wellbeing and prevent deterioration are routinely or often missed, meaning people’s health and wellbeing worsens.
- People are not given the choice to discuss or access healthier options for diet, lifestyle, physical activity, personal, oral hygiene and health needs.
- The service does not support people to access health checks or other additional services to improve their health and wellbeing or fails to do so at the right time.
- Advice and recommendations for care, support and treatment by other professionals are not sought or followed.
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